Little Sister
by Stupidusernamepolicy
Summary: In a destroyed village, one lone survivor is taken into custody of Death himself. Everything's been going merry and well so far, but what will change when she enrolls DWMA? First fanfiction, please review? Full cover, Q/A, Requests are all on my DeviantART and Tumblr: Stupidusernamepolicy
1. A little sister?

_**Prelude**_

* * *

**Thursday, March 15th, 07:54 p.m.**

It was a normal sun set, except in one little village in Japan. Just few hours ago it was a normal place to live, but then, a clan of Kishins that were carving for souls attacked. They were merciless and left no one. But when the Meisters from Shibusen arrived, they heard someone… Crying.

They came to one of ruined houses, moved few broken planks and saw a baby with black hair and big emerald green eyes. They couldn't just leave the baby there and brought it back to Shibusen to consol with Lord Death, or put it up for adoption. Little did they know, they'd end up doing both at the same time. The Grim Reaper said that baby will need a home and that he'll be happy to take it in. They knew he had a son, still a little boy, and thought he only wanted for his son not to grow up alone.

With that in mind, they put the baby to his care.

* * *

**Saturday, June 21st, 07:23 a.m.**

It was early morning at Death City, Sun was to soon come out and start its daily ritual of crossing the sky. At the Gallows Mansion a boy with black hair, white striped hair on right side of it, clear, bit pale skin and golden yellow eyes known as Death the Kidd was finishing his morning symmetry check routine, before hearing a voice from upstairs

"Big brother?"

He replied with a quiet sigh "Yes?"

A girl in her early teens came downstairs. She had messy, shoulder length black hair, big emerald green eyes, and was wearing blue pajamas.

"You're already up?" She asked, "It's Saturday, you should get some more sleep, you stayed up for a pretty long time last night…"

"I got enough sleep. Besides, I can't just skip morning check, now can I?"

She sighed and shook her head at that reply, she was well aware of his OCD and got used to it but through time, it has made big problems to both him and her. She just shrug shoulders and replied

"I guess…" She then went to kitchen then said: "Want something to eat?"

"No, thank you." He said, leaving the room "I'll go for a walk… And please, wake up Liz and Patty before 11 AM."

She smiled "Roger that." and gone upstairs to dress.


	2. Third Month, Problems Already?

_**Chapter 2:**_

_**Third Month,**_

_**Problems Already?**_

* * *

**Saturday, June 21st, 08:04 a.m.**

The young Shinigami was walking through Death City as people were opening their shops, wind was gently blowing, it was a nice morning but even so, he soon got bored and came home. He didn't fancy holidays and breaks. He had almost nothing to do.

When he came home he noticed that mansion was noticeably quieter than when he left.

"Hm?" He walked into mansion, "Tachi-san?"

There was a note on table saying: _"I went to visit a friend, I'll be back 'til 10."_

He just shrug shoulders as it was normal for her to wander off at times and went to wake up Liz and Patty.

* * *

**08:10 a.m.**

Tachiko was walking down street, heading to Maka's apartment. She was wearing a white t-shirt with blue kanji writing on it, unbuttoned black vest and shorts. It was a fairly warm day already.

She was walking, spacing out completely, when she bumped into a boy that was running, and they both fell to ground. She rubbed her head, sat up as a rather nervous voice spoke to her:

"Oh! I'm so sorry… Are you alright?"

She got a better look at the stranger. It was boy that looked about her age. He was a brunette with tan skin and deep blue eyes. He put a hand down to her, and pulled her up.

"Geez.. That was quite a fall, eh?"

"No kidding…" she got up and dusted off. "I haven't seen you around here.."

"Don't blame you, I just recently moved here. I'm Yoshiki, Yoshiki Kaziya"

" Tachiko" She replied

"Tachiko, hmmm?" he looked at her in silence "... Such a weird name indeed!"

"E-eh?"

"I didn't mean that as a bad thing, just that it's unusual." He shrugged, looking away.

"… Well, I guess that's okay."

"Hey, Tachiko-san.. I know we just met, but you seem like pretty cool of a person…" he looked back to her and smiled "Care for a drink if ya got time? I'd like to talk to you for a bit more."

She thought for a few seconds, then smiled "Sure!"

Little did they know, they'd be exchanging those smiles almost on a daily basis from that day on.

* * *

"So, you're a weapon?" Tachiko asked him once they sat down and ordered drinks

"Yuuuup! A Demon Katana!" he said before taking a long gulp of his Cola. "You?"

"I don't have any weapon powers… Though, I'd like to become a Meister, just like my brother."

"Your brother?"

She nodded and smiled "He's amazing with his twin pistols, or so I hear… Father says he isn't doing bad at school either."

"School? You mean like the Shibusen?"

"Yup! Father's the principal!"

At this point Yoshiki almost spit his drink

"Your father's Lord Death!?"

"Is that a big deal?"

"It's a huge deal!" he continued talking, awestruck "That means your brother is- A-are you going to be his successor!?"

"N-no, it's nothing like that…" She smiled nervously. "I was adopted… I heard rumors that father wanted someone to grow up alongside his son… I was lucky to be picked out…"

"S-still! That's a huge deal!"

"Come on, Yoshiki-san… You're embarrassing me…" Tachiko rubbed back of her head.

"Hey hey! I just got the idea so crazy, it just might work!"

"What is it?" Tachiko said, taking a sip of her frozen Matcha tea

"Let's pair up!"

* * *

**Monday, September 12th, 01:03 p.m.**

It was first day of School, and also Tachiko's and Yoshiki's first day at the academy. They were placed into the Crescent Moon class. It was relatively silent;

Maka was reading a book, Soul was by her lazily looking through the class, half asleep, Black*Star wasn't there yet, he was again discussing something with professor Sidney. Tsubaki was in one of back seats waiting for him. Tachiko was in one of first row seats, with Yoshiki by her while Kidd was in front of Maka, Between Liz and Patty, looking at Yoshiki with a bit suspicious look in his eyes. Liz soon noticed it, stopped polishing her nails and looked at him saying:

"I thought you agreed not to mind his asymmetry… Guy's got uneven bangs that cover his eye completely, so what?"

"It's not just the asymmetry that's bothering me this time…" He mutters "He met Tachiko not even a month ago and they partnered up just like that..."

"Oh please Kidd... He's been taking a good care of her. That's just some brotherly concern you're facing"

"He's probably jealousss!" Patty voiced in her happy tone

Kidd was going to protest, but then professor Sidney and Black*Star walked into the classroom, Black*Star having a blue eye.

"Now class…"

Kidd was suspicious but after giving it some thought let it slide.

* * *

**Friday, November 8th, 06:10 p.m.**

Although it was eighth day in month, and Friday with that along, neither Tachiko nor Kidd seemed too happy about either. Kidd went straight to the mansion while Tachiko decided to study with Maka in library for a bit.

"I don't know what's his problem, it's like he's jealous or something." Tachiko said while putting a book back to shelf

"Who?" replied Maka as she was coming back to one of tables

"And who do you think? Kidd, that's who…" Tachiko said while going down the ladder "I know he means best but really, he could put more trust in Yoshiki…"

"Don't be so sure…" Said Maka sitting by her opening another book "You just met him few months ago and by an accident. You had a small chat and that's it." she glanced over to her "You can't be so sure that's something you can rely on. Take Soul and me as example… It was not an accident, but a visit and we had more time to meet each other better and I'm completely sure I can trust him with my life." She gets a bit sad look on face, again looking down to book "His scar was the proof of that…"

"I guess you're right about that… I don't know that much about him either… Well, it can't be helped" she got up and turned around, taking her bag. "I'm gonna go talk to him."

"H-hey, wait a second! What about studying? We have a test on Wednesday!" Maka said, but Tachiko didn't mind her, she was already out of library. She was thinking about what Maka said. Yes, she had rushed into making partners with Yoshiki but she never thought he could be a bad guy or anything short of at least a good friend. She walked to his dorm and knocked on doors "Hey, Yoshiki, you there?"

No response

After a couple of seconds she knocked again and peeped a bit trough keyhole. "Hmm…" she whispered, "I wonder where he had went…"


	3. Street Attack

_**Chapter 3:**_

_**Street Attack**_

* * *

**Friday, November 8th, 06:37**

Kidd was walking back to Gallows Mansion. It had started snowing but he paid no mind to it.

Though he felt he was trebling from cold here and there, having only his usual attire on and no jacket; He obviously did not expect snow. He had rarely ever seen it, counting Death City was surrounded by a desert only a few years ago, despite the fact that it's now shrouded in a forest from almost all sides.

He was walking in silence as snow drifted down. He was thinking about what he heard on the morning news; a new gang formed, attacking seemingly random people.

He was so busy with his thoughts he let his guard down

Ah, speak of the Devil.

He was half way to the Mansion when something hard hit back of his neck. The force from the hit knocked him down and blurred his vision. While he was trying to regain himself, five tall figures approached him.

Just as he was going to push himself up one of them grabbed him by his neck and lifted him off ground.

"Look who we have here" the man spoke, but his voice wasn't human. It was more like he was speaking through a radio mask "Grim Reaper's son…"

Kidd tried to loosen his grip but nothing. The tall man's grip was still metal strong.

"You are just the one we need.. Sister can't say no to her brother, no?" he tightened the grip "So, what do you say?"

Kidd was barely breathing because of grip on his neck so answering was the last thing on his mind. Though, he knew that if he didn't get some air soon he'll pass out. If that man doesn't crush his neck first, that is. His vision finally cleared a bit and the image focused into a man with a black cap, a scarf covering lower half of his face along with a radio mask, but the eyes were the strangest. Irises the shade of a dark purple-blue in narrowed eyes, like he was smirking.

"…. My, how rude of me." he said, dropping him to the ground "So, what do you say now, kiddo?"

Kidd fell onto the cold concrete, hitting his head in the process. He was trying to regain his breath and started coughing. The tall man was visibly displeased by that reaction.

"Tch. That's Grim Reaper's son? How disappointing." he said in a disgusted tone before bashing Kidd's stomach with his foot a few times to keep him from getting up and counterattacking. "Answer me, you spoiled brat."

The man soon became more violent. He got as far as almost breaking black haired boy's arm before one of his men, who stood still like robots all this time, spoke

"Boss."

"Hm?" he replied, suddenly calming down. He looked over his shoulder and saw two figures nearing them in the distance. "Ah, got it… Retreat."

"What about the kid?"

"Leave him here, he'd only slow us down. I have a better way to get the girl come around…" he replied

They got away before the two figures, Black*Star and Tsubaki, got there.

* * *

**Saturday, November 9th, 09:53 a.m.**

Kidd woke up in Dispensary and his first sight was the white ceiling of the room. He looked to his right and saw Tachiko who was sitting by him, asleep. Her hair was bit messy and she had slight bags under eyes, it was obvious she was all night there and fell asleep just around few hours ago.

The boy sat up, still feeling pain from bruises and strong pain in head, he brushed through hair on back of his head with fingers and before stopping them at a piece of soft fabric.

A bandage.

He then looked at rest of his body, he had bandages on several places and dried blood seen on some on them. He started recalling things that happened the day before. Tachiko just began wake up when Professor Stein walked in.

"Good Morning professor…" she sleepily greeted him, rubbing her eyes.

"Good Morning Tachiko-san " he replied then looked over to Kidd "And Good Morning Kidd-kun"

"Good Morning…" He said, clearly still woozy.

Stein adjusted his glasses, turning to Tachiko "I'll go report to Shinigami-sama, please talk to him and find out what happened meanwhile."

"Got it.." she replied, straightening up on the chair. The Professor then left the room, leaving the siblings alone.

"Kidd?" she said turning to him "Um, can I ask you about yesterday?"

He nodded and sat up. "I was on my way back home.. Something hit the back of my head.. I couldn't see very well from that point on, but I recall seeing five people. One lifted me off ground and-" he stopped at that part. He thought what he should tell, then continued: "… I don't recall well what he asked of me. He dropped me down and I don't remember the rest."

Tachiko listened, her face was dead serious.

"A-alright, I guess, it's time for me to tell what happened afterwards…" she cleared her throat and continued "I went home when I heard from professor Sidney that Black*Star and Tsubaki found you beaten in the snow.. You were in the Dispensary by the time I arrived, that's all I know."

"I see…" he replied but just a second afterward Liz darted into room and hugged Kidd, followed by Patty. A second after them Soul, Maka, Black*Star and Tsubaki walked in too to check up on their friend.


	4. Calmer Day

_**Chapter 4:**_

_**A Calmer Day**_

* * *

**Saturday, November 9th, 10:14 a.m.**

"I'm gonna go get your clothes and lunch from the mansion. I'll be back soon" She said while getting Putting on her jacket "Also, Professor Stein said you've got no serious wounds so you'll be in school by Monday again" she smiled "See ya"

She was soon again on the streets. The snow from yesterday covered everything, from roofs and streets to cars and balconies, and it was still going. It was a freezing cold morning, but for Tachiko it was the favorite kind. She was walking through heaps of snow whenever she got the chance and slid on the frozen puddles. She enjoyed the fresh air and the silver-white streets. She hasn't seen Yoshiki since yesterday afternoon but she didn't pay it any mind at the time. She was worried about her brother. She knew well that Kidd won't recover so swiftly.

_"Kidd got a really hard blow in head, I can't say if that will do anything bad yet but I know it will take a long while to heal." _Professor Stein's words echoed in her head. She didn't even notice that she was already walking on the Guillotine Path of their front yard.

_"Father has a strange sense when it comes to decoration." _She often thought while passing there, even as a kid.

She walked in and went straight to Kidd's bedroom and took clothes for him and on her way out the lunch she packed in the kitchen, then headed back to Shibusen.

After a while she saw a group of people coming towards her- No, better said surrounding her; those were same people who attacked Kidd. Everyone of them was masked.

"Little Miss.." the tall man with radio mask spoke. "Would you be so kind to come with us?"

It didn't take her long to connect the lines and figure out those were the people that attacked her older brother. She recoiled as the tall man took a step further and kneeled on one knee. He waited for her response but became annoyed after about five seconds; patience wasn't his stronger side.

He cleared his throat and tried to make his voice to sound softer, though he obviously forgot that the radio mask was destroying any sweetness.

"Little Miss-" Was all he got to say before he got hit in the face with full force of Tachiko's foot. He put face in his hands. She used the opening and ran

"Little brat…" he said before looking up and smirking "Just like her father…"

The men chased after her but soon lost her. She hid in an alleyway as they passed her, breathing heavily. She waited for a minute or two to make sure they're gone then continued to Shibusen.

Meanwhile Kidd was in Dispensary, resting. He knew he told a lie, but he didn't want to risk her panicking. She now thinks they're just street robbers or something of that kind. The silence was broken by sound of doors opening. Kidd sat up.

It was Yoshiki.

"H-hey Kidd-kun." He said, "I heard what happened, I'm sorry I didn't come earlier, family business.. So, feeling any better?"

"A bit." He looked at Yoshiki, trying to figure out the aim of his visit.

"I brought something, my dad said it's some kind of family medicine. It helps a lot with headaches." he said while taking a bottle with some amber colored liquid in it out of bag and putting it on table. "He used to make me swallow down a teaspoon of it after I hit my head while playing and such as a kid…" He slightly smiled "It has the worst taste, like old sugar syrup, but it works. And also, it's strong so don't drink too much at once"

"Thanks" Kidd replied.

"No problem" He turned on his heel to exit "Well, see ya Kidd-kun, I have to visit Tachiko, I bet she's head over heels angry at me for literally disappearing out of blue." And walked out.

Kidd was just thinking and looking at bottle. He knew that he wouldn't try to poison him with such a visible way but he still had his suspicions. Not long after Tachiko walked in to drop off clean clothes. She then gone back to search for Yoshiki who she ran into merely two minutes after leaving Dispensary.

* * *

**Saturday, November 9th, 11:28 p.m.**

Kidd was let go from the Dispensary and went back home. In late afternoon he finally decided to take the medicine (with Tachiko giving him a _light _push). He drank just a little, like Yoshiki told him and had the taste he described. He then made the nightly check and went to bed around midnight. He fell asleep at least a hour later because of so many things that happened last few days; His body was tired, but mind was working, along with the headache he was having. Though, he fell asleep as soon as the headache medicine started to work.

_"Maybe Yoshiki isn't such a bad guy after all…" _he thought before falling asleep, his suspicion had lowered a lot, though did not disappear completely.


	5. Soul Festival! Preparations begin

**Monday, November 11th, 09:05 a.m. - Class Crescent Moon**

It was a cold morning, students in Crescent Moon class were talking about upcoming festival, everyone seemed pretty excited about it, but there was one who wasn't happy about it at all.

"Awwwhhh…" Tachiko yawned "Again the Soul festival… And I thought about finally getting good night's sleep…"

"Come on" her partner Yoshiki said, "It's gonna be fun. Besides, we're getting a new student" he continued in a quiet tone so he wouldn't catch someone else's attention too, "I heard he comes from an important family… It's just the rumors but there's a big possibility it's true. I wonder who is it.."

"Beats me…" she replied in sleepy tone. Professor Sidney then walked in

"Alright students. Today we'll learn about special soul wavelengths, learn most common ones and important ones in history… Open your book on page 98. Oh also, Tachiko, Yoshiki, Kidd, Liz, Patty Maka, Soul. Lord Death said wants to discuss something with you about Soul Festival. You're dismissed for now but come back to class after it."

_"I knew it" _Tachiko whispered under breath while getting up. The 7 walked out of classroom,

"I wonder why Black*Star and Tsubaki weren't called too" Said Maka on way to Death Room

"They are probably assigned to do something…" replied Soul

"Well, whatever it is, they won't achieve much by sending Black*Star" said Liz "He's too easily distracted by… himself."

"Heh, Tsubaki is gonna make him work at least a little, you know how it goes" chuckled Yoshiki

They spent rest of way lively chatting about everything that came to their minds. They almost forgot that they headed to Death Room. Luckily, while their minds were occupied their legs like they walked on their own and in few minutes got to Death Room. While walking on Guillotine path, they made themselves to get serious again, even if no one wanted to break the happy atmosphere they had just a minute ago.

"Hello, Wassup Wassup? How is everyone?" Lord Death greeted them in his usual lively tone. They all replied in synced voice: "Hello Shinigami-sama"

"Great, you're all here." He said "I wanted to ask you all a favor for Soul Festival, as you may heard from professor Sidney…" he continued in slightly more serious voice "As you may heard, there were numerous attacks of citizens all trough city, with seemingly no point… They may be terrorists, and in that case, I need two Meister - Weapon pairs. I already took care of one, Black*Star and Tsubaki, who would want to be second pair?"

Tachiko raised her hand and asked: "May it be Yoshiki and I?"

"Of course." he replied and continued in his usual happy tone "Well, now that is solved! And I wanted to ask you others to help Spirit, Nygus and Justin with decorations?"

They agreed to do it. Lord Death then dimissed them and they walked out heading for classroom.

"Who's that Justin he spoke about? Never heard of him.." Yoshiki said with slight questioning tone

"He's a Deathscythe, the youngest that graduated and along with that without a meister" Replied Tachiko "Festival is a pretty big event, No wonder why he put guards. There are going to be a lot of tourists, and many Deathscythes and possibly their partners are going to come.."

"I heard that a monkey and a bear will come!" Said Patty in her happy voice

"You gotta be kidding…" Replied Yoshiki, clearly not believing her.

"Nope" replied Kidd, "Tezca Tlipoca, The Demon Mirror that is currently in charge of South America, he wears a bear mask… And Monkey was no metaphor, his name is Enrique and he's Tezca's meister"

"Wow… This place is even more awesome than I read it was.." Replied Yoshiki

* * *

**11:00 a.m. (big break time)**

Everyone was resting from last three classes, Black*Star and Tsubaki were on one of Balconies, Kidd was in Library with Liz, Patty and Maka, searching for ideas for decorations, Soul was outside the classroom talking with Yoshiki while Tachiko was inside classroom reading a book, after a minute Yoshiki walked in the classroom and headed toward front seats "Oi, Tachiko?"

"Hm?" she looked up from book

"Do you really think it was a good idea to sign up as a guard? I mean, we aren't experienced fighters…" he said

"It was a better idea than signing up for decorations." she replied in calm voice while leaning back "Besides, we have 17 souls already and we'll be accompanied by Black*Star who is a pretty experienced fighter himself. Or we'll be accompanied with some of professors, nobody goes to a patrol post alone, especially not students, so we'll be safe."

"I guess you're right" he smiled and headed back outside "How much time do we have left 'til next class?"

"Now's 11:15, so we have 15 more minutes until next period." She replied while looking at him. When he left she got back to reading the book. _"We'll be safe" _She kept saying those words even if she wasn't completely sure if that's true. She was now just blankly staring at book _"Why am I making such a big deal out of this? It's just another festival. I just need to get my head straight and get a good sleep before it. I can't offer falling asleep on the post."_

Her thoughts about festival, terrorists and new student were soon interrupted by bell ringing for start of next period, biology.

* * *

**02:30 p.m. - Hallway**

Tachiko, Tsubaki and Maka were walking in hallway, heading for outside

"Gee, I wonder where are others..." Said Tachiko in rather tired voice, breaking silence

"Soul and Black*Star are probably again discussing something or fighting... Kidd is still in library, probably planning to talk with Lord Death afterwards. I don't know where are Liz, Patty and Yoshiki"

"Oh, I've seen Liz and Patty rushing out of classroom with Kim and Jackie, they are probably going shopping." Tsubaki added with her kind smile. "What about Yoshiki?"

"He's probably in his dorm, I dunno" Tachiko replied "He's skeptic about us being guards"

"Oh, that reminded me" said Tsubaki, "Professor Sidney asked me to tell you two, Tachiko, you and Yoshiki are on watch post three with Black*Star and me, and Maka, at half past four today at class Crescent Moon is making a meeting of ones who signed up for Decorations and preparations, you will be making props for festival with other students."

"Oh yeah, thanks Tsubaki" Maka replied.

"it's no problem" Tsubaki said with her usual kind smile on face

"I'm looking forward to being on guard post with you and Black*Star, you two are experienced fighters after all" Tachiko smiled

"I'm looking forward for it too." Tsubaki replied

"Well, I gotta get going..." Tachiko yawned, "See ya" she waved and walked off.


	6. A famous friend

**Wednesday, November 13th, 07:31 - Gallows Mansion**

Kidd was sitting in dining room, already fully dressed, at top of table where he usually does with a pile of books at his both sides, even and balanced with one opened in front of him. Light was on but room still seemed dark because of monotone colored walls; Black and White. He didn't move in a while, just to flip pages, and who knows for how long it would have carried on if Tachiko haven't walked in. She was wearing her usual blue pajamas and black slippers, carrying two cups.

"Good Morning" She said as she sat down by him, placing one of cups in front of him "What're you doing? Studying, looking for decorations or… something else?" She added that last one with a slight smirk.

"Second was correct, Decorations." He looked up to her "And I know that last 'Something else' meant a romance novel" He said with a slight smile

"Aw, you got me. But I know you don't read that kind of stuff" she replied with a smile "Here, I made you cocoa, it's cold outside. With a little of instant coffee mixed in, you know, just few small beds, to keep you awake today counting you woke up early today as well."

"Thank you.. sis" He smiled bit wider so that a smile was clearly seen

"No problem!" She replied and took a sip from her cup "Should I go wake up Liz and Patty?"

"No, let them sleep for a few more minutes, they aren't used to getting up too early." he replied, not getting look off book, and taking another sip of cocoa

"Right." she agreed

* * *

They spent a longer time talking, seemingly forgetting what happened just almost a week ago. But it was completely opposite; Both were thinking. Kidd was still almost banging his head against the wall to know why they wanted to find Tachiko and she was thinking why they had to attack Kidd. Of course, they didn't know if they talked to each other and said each other truth, That Kidd wasn't attacked cause of DWMA's weak spots or just for fun but cause of information about his adopted younger sister, the pieces would start to fall together without almost no help, and the problems that were to emerge in near future would maybe be stopped on time, but because Kidd was afraid he'd put her in only more danger than she already is. Well, no matter cause of that because, it's as they say, the fate chooses it's favorites.

**01:12 p.m. - DWMA / Training yard**

Classes today ended earlier because of preparations for upcoming festival. It was only two days until the festival so everyone's in hurry. Deathscythes, tourists, citizens, their friends and family, all looking forward to festival. Students and professors of DWMA were the main ones in organizing the festivals so they divided into three groups: Ones taking care of food preparation, decorations and props team and last but not least, guards. All had a lot of things to do and take care of. Currently, Kim, Jacqueline and Killik were in cafeteria, preparing dishes with other classmates, Kidd, Maka, Liz, Patty and Soul were in one of classes, working with other student on props and Tachiko, Yoshiki, Tsubaki and Black*Star were in training yard with professor Sidney, Nygus and Stein. Training because, as guards, they have to intervene if something suspicious or even dangerous were to happen. After a longer time training, they took a break. Tachiko was feeling exhausted and even Black*Star, who usually barely even breaks a sweat, was feeling worn out. They both sat down for a bit, while Tsubaki and Yoshiki transformed back.

"Do we really need to train this hard?" she said while still trying to catch breath "They surely won't attack us with an army…"

Black*Star just scoffed and said: "A little training won't kill you"

"Yeah, says one that is used to training every day to 'surpass god'…" replied Tachiko

"Hey, I will one day! I'm closer and closer to doing it every day!" he said in his cocky tone "I am the man who will surpass god! But don't feel small around me, even if you are."

She chuckled at that reply, she knew well about his ambition and ego size of the continent Asia, and it was actually amusing her rather than annoying her. "Sure you will" she said and took a sip of water.

Stein clapped his hands few times then said: "Come on you four, break is over. Let's train for a little longer so that we can after that all go to lunch."

"Yes professor" they got up and continued training that carried on for longer time…

* * *

**04:07 p.m. - Maka's apartment**

"Well, making light blue and orange-red lamps for festival was fun" Said Maka, sitting down to couch "what about training?"

"I can barely move but you can tell that it was successful by that." replied Tachiko "And thanks for letting me stay here to rest, I really don't think I would hold to Gallows Mansion, counting it's almost on other side of city."

"It's no problem" Maka smiled "Besides, that's what friends do."

Tachiko smiled back, drank what remained of water in her glass and got up "Well, I'd better get going. See ya tomorrow at school"

"See ya" Maka replied as Tachiko left the apartment

As she was walking down streets, Tachiko kept looking down to ground, she was nervous because of festival and had a feeling something bad is going to happen. Not the usual one, but the one that almost causes pain in the forehead. Streets were almost empty, much to her dismay. She'd feel a lot better if there were people around her but counting cold weather lately, empty streets were nothing unusual. Sun has almost set, and sky was getting darker and darker, making it even colder, though she didn't mind, she just covered nose with scarf and continued to walk with hands in pocket of her trench coat. Suddenly she felt a breeze colder than other ones, she heard a voice behind her saying "Hi…"

She felt as if her blood has been turned to ice. It was a cold voice of a boy. She turned and saw a boy, about her age. He had messy black hair with some of it up with white-grayish headband. He wore black unzipped winter jacket and a gray shirt with dirty-cyan colored low collar, same colored end of it and on a single stripe (again same color) on elbow under it. He wore pants colored in dark shade of gray, black shoes with stripes colored like ones on shirt and a black glove without fingers on right hand. His skin was pale, and eyes big and weary-looking colored in darker shade of gray. Tachiko couldn't help but think that they looked kind of… dead.

"H-hi" she replied.

"Oh, I'm sorry if I interrupted your thinking… I just thought, since you're only one on street, you'd like some company.." he said while slightly looking down but soon looked back up. "I'm Rin." he put a hand out for a handshake.

"I'm Tachiko" She replied while shaking his hand "Nice to meet you Rin." she smiled but soon realized something "W-wait, you look familiar.. Are you Rin Yakari, son of Yuna and Hiroshi Yakari, praised politicians in government of United States of Japan? ((just fictional, not actual people (I think))

He sighed "Sadly, yes." he took off glove and showed a mark on top side of his palm; it looked like a three pedestal flower in a thin-lined circle. "I hate saying it to anyone, because then they start talking, asking me questions and cause noise… If there's one thing I hate, that's noise…"

"Oh. Well, don't worry, I won't tell anyone" she said "promise"

He slightly smiled "Thanks Tachiko, you're a nice person"

"It's no problem" She smiled back.

"Well, I'd better get back home, parents will get worried." he turned and waved "See you around"

"Bye." she turned too and walked off to mansion.

* * *

**05:46 p.m. - Gallows Mansion**

It was a so-so calm evening. Tachiko was making dinner, Kidd just finished with symmetry check he does after school, then got back to finding decoration ideas in books, though he had a headache he tried to ignore. Liz was in dining room, polishing her nails, Patty was by her, making another origami giraffe.

Kidd continued to look in the book but soon gave up because headache was wearing him out, he took an aspirin then headed upstairs _"Maybe it's cause of today, we had a busy day… It'll go away after a nap.."_ he thought and gone to his room. He changed clothes, took some of medicine for headache Yoshiki gave him last week and laid on bed, he felt that his headache was starting to release as he drifted off. Tachiko was done making curry and rice that were for dinner, so she went to dining room to tell Liz and Patty to set up the table, then to living room to call Kidd. seeing he's not there, she gone back to dining room

"Hey, Liz? Did you see Kidd? He isn't on his usual place…" said Tachiko peeping with head into the dining room.

Liz was currently putting plates, "I think I saw him going upstairs." she replied

"Oh okay. Well, thanks" she said and gone upstairs to his room, she opened doors and wanted to say something but then noticed he was sleeping, she just smiled _"He looks tired…. I'll wake him up at seven." _She thought while closing doors _"Just so he doesn't refill all energy… He wouldn't be able to sleep during night if he did now."_ she continued in her mind and gone downstairs.

"Kidd is sleeping, so he'll have dinner a bit later" she said while putting rice and curry on her plate.

"Oh, alright." Liz replied before taking a bite, Patty was already eating like she haven't in years

Tachiko cleaned up after dinner and looked at one of clocks on wall; 0_6:57_. She gone upstairs to wake her big brother up.


	7. Troublesome festival

**A****/N: Hello! This is Helena and I just wanted to apologize it took me a long time for chapter 5. Anyways, I plan something exciting for end and I hope that I'm improving in writing. That's it for now.**

* * *

_**Chapter 7:**_

_**Troublesome Festival**_

**Friday, November 15th, 02:44 p.m. - Shinigami Square**

It was a quite warm day, perfect for start of festival. Students of DWMA have been on the square since morning, setting it up for starting day of festival, which is going to last for a whole week. The other citizens had been setting their booths with all kinds of stuff for festivals; lamps, face paint, all kinds of festival foods and props. Even if festival is going to start by the sun set, they had a lot of job to do before.

Kidd was currently hanging skulls, Maka was setting up a stand with face paint with Soul helping her, Liz and Patty were busy helping Kim and Jacqueline set up food stands, Killik was holding Fire and Thunder on his shoulders while they were trying to hang a prop looking like human soul. Tachiko was trying to hang red lamp that was supposed to represent a soul of an evil human above the main stage, opposite of light blue lamp that was representing human soul, but not really succeeding in it; It kept falling out of her hands or wind blew it out of her hands. Though, a purple lamp representing witch soul which was supposed to hang between of one of Human and one of a Kishin, (but a little behind, so that they form a triangle) kept swinging and pushing it out.

"Aw, geez…" she groaned while getting off ladder and picking lamp back up "This one is troublesome as that girl's soul… What was her name again, Sophie Slaughter?"

"Yup" replied Yoshiki, who was holding ladder while she climbed back "Only you seem to have more trouble with this one" he chuckled.

"Yea, yea, just you mock" she said while smiling and hanging the lamp "Done!" she said before lamp fell onto her head again

"Now we just need to make you shine" he laughed while she took it off and put it back on its place.

"Well, now that's at last done." black haired meister said while climbing off, but ladder was shook by Killik who stumbled backwards because Fire and Thunder got into fight around who will hang the last soul prop. Tachiko stumbled and fell off right on her back

"Ow…"

Killik finally managed to calm his weapons then gone to Tachiko "Hey, you okay?" he said while offering her a hand "Fire and Thunder sometimes can act just like little kids" he continued while helping her get up.

"It's okay, it's good that something else has been falling for a change instead of that lamp" She smiled, but then lamp again flew to her head "really?" girl continued in annoyed tone

Yoshiki just sighed trying to hold back laugh "Let me before you fall again" he picked it up, climbed and got it back in its place then jumped off.

"It's cause I've got it to listen, you just finished the job" she played as if she was one who hanged it

"Heheh, always playing the best one in the group" the weapon chuckled.

"Well, when I am." She said, and even though she was joking she kept serious look on her face like she means it.

"Well, see ya then you two, Fire spotted caramel apples and they won't leave me 'til they both get one" Killik smiled bit nervously and walked away with Fire and Thunder on his head.

"Well, we better get going too, people will soon start coming, we better meet up with Black*Star and Tsubaki.

"Right." meister agreed and walked with him.

* * *

**05:04 p.m.**

Sun was low on horizon, with already a sleepy face. Skies were clear with only few clouds, so it was clearly seen they started to take on an warm shade of orange, and clouds on a bright pink color. Lord Death himself was standing on the stage, just between-under lamps that represented Human and Kishin souls, with Kidd to his right.

The square was full with people, with them filling next few streets around square, it was time for Lord Death's speech. so everyone was silently chatting while waiting. Tachiko and Black*Star were west of stage, not too far away from it, holding Yoshiki as Katana and Tsubaki as Kusurigama (chain scythe).

"Well then!" Grim Reaper suddenly spoke, making the chatter stop almost instantly, "Another semester is coming to an end and yet another Soul festival is just starting! I just want to thank fellow professors and students for helping citizens set up all the decorations. Now, I won't bore you with a too long speech. Kidd-kun?" he said when looking to his son.

Young Shinigami cleared his throat and continued instead of his father "The festival will begin when Sun completely sets, and fireworks fire." he said in his monotone voice.

After speech, Black*Star suddenly spoke: "Oi, Tachiko… Why weren't you on stage too? I mean, you are Kidd's-" he was cut off by Tachiko putting hand over his mouth

"Shhh!" she said while removing her hand "Listen, nobody but you, Tsubaki, Yoshiki, Maka, Liz, Patty and Soul know that I'm his adopted sister and I want it to stay that way" she sighed "And what about you? Weren't you gonna show up out of nowhere and do your speech?"

"Nah." blue haired meister replied "This time I'd rather skip that. Besides, Tsubaki wouldn't let me, and I kinda understand her, I had a weird feeling something important is going to happen"

"No kidding" she said while looking trough crowd. She saw fluff of black hair on the side of crowd. Her mood fixed a little when she saw that was Rin. She wasn't just imagining him last night.

He was currently talking to professor Stein, with Kidd soon joining them. Of course, because of big distance between two guard posts, but mostly cause of noise, Tachiko couldn't hear what they were talking about, but she could clearly see that Stein was smoking and holding Spirit in his weapon form, that Rin was in his calm self as he was yesterday evening and that Kidd again had headache.

Black*Star has turned too, looking at crowd "But I gotta admit, the stage isn't bad, I bet audience would love me!" he spoke in his cocky voice

Tachiko sighed, not even a second later she felt something hard connecting with upper back of her neck, she fell to ground with her vision blurring; it was clear that she was going to pass out of she doesn't regain herself soon. She wasn't sure what happened from then; she felt woozy, only thing she could feel is a dim pain in back of neck with a feeling of warm fluid trickle from it down her back when someone pulled her and started running, last thing she saw before passing out was Kidd running towards her, aiming for person who was holding her.

What actually happened after she was hit was that Black*Star immediately turned because of sound hit made. He was knocked away, while Stein, Spirit and Kidd were running to there. Black*Star swiftly got up and it was clear same moment who snatched Tachiko; brown eyes, piercings and big brown leather gloves,

it was Giriko.

Same moment he grabbed Tachiko saw blades appeared on his leather boots, he rode backwards. Black*Star, followed by Yoshiki, ran and slashed at Giriko who smoothly dodged. Kidd's attack was head on, fueled by mere rage and worry, weakened with his headache getting best of him, was easily denied by a counterattack.

Rin was watching it all from a distance, in a calm manner, like he was watching a boring play. He watched all attempts of attack from Black*Star, Yoshiki and Kidd before Stein catched up and done an attack himself, but it was too late. Giriko stuck out his tongue at them before he rode into portal that was glowing light pink that appeared behind him. Yoshiki jumped into portal right after him before they both disappeared, along with portal. In that second, fireworks were fired into skies and exploded in shapes of souls.

Stein suddenly stopped in front of place portal was. Black*Star, of course, tried to catch up with Yoshiki but ended up running into a tree when portal closed, though Kidd, when he stopped running, felt like his head was pounding hard like it's threatening it will blow up any second.

"Their soul response disappeared…" Stein spoke after few long seconds of silence interrupted by nothing else than sounds of fireworks exploding. "All three of them, the second they gone into that portal.."

"What do you mean by that?" said Black*Star in voice in what was clearly heard held back rage.

"That they teleported into a place pretty far away.. And portal was some kind of warp hole"

"Any choice of tracking them down?" Kidd asked. He sat down, headache was wearing him out really bad, while he was trying to put pressure on a wound to stop bleeding; a cut from Giriko's Sawfoot. Even without being too deep, it hurt pretty badly too.

Black*Star got away with just merely a few bruises and a cut on the leg.

Others soon arrived, and after a good amount of questions, got them back to DWMA. But Kidd only lasted for half way to Dispensary before headache got better of him, making him collapse.

Silently, Rin was following them without them noticing. He followed them all the way trough to Dispensary then decided to wait and listen from outside. All he heard were worried voices from a female; Liz, a voice of an adult explaining what happened; Stein and angry yelling of a boy; Black*Star. Yelling made him slightly narrow eyes because as he said earlier, he couldn't stand noise.

Upon realizing that his yelling won't calm down in a longer time, he turned and walked away, eyes glued to ground and hands in pockets, _"Is this really the school I'm going to go to? I can't find a partner to team up with, I lost my first friend, or whatever they call them… And then this." _he got one of balconies and looked up into the night sky

_"Are those people who kidnapped Tachiko-san really them…? The fear of east that was asleep for all those years…?"_ he couldn't stand it, he felt a desire of ripping another portal and going after them. He held for fence and looked back down, then said in his quiet, hoarse voice "If those show up again… It'll be more trouble for Death City than they could imagine…" he shouted into the night in anger: "Show yourselves you assholes! Deal with royalty you had a grudge on for so long! I'm right here!"

Even he knew the best that the people he shouted to won't hear a word he says, he had to let it out. At the moment, there was a dilemma in his mind he had not being used to deal with; Should tell them what he knows or let the things go on their own? He had a doubt in everything around him, so why should he let someone he doesn't trust get their hands on the information. But if he doesn't, who knows what could happen to everyone mentioned. Trusting no one still doesn't mean he wants something bad to happen to all those people. He had to clear his mind but he didn't want to. Something made him decide to stay aside and watch the flow of things, if it gets too serious, he'll tell, but only if it's necessary.

_"Damn it all…" _he thought to himself, _"If The East Evil gets their hands on the weapon they lost, this whole rotten world will be theirs… But if I'm wrong… I guess I'll just have to see what happens…" _he sighed and walked away.


	8. Rescue Plan

**A/N: Well, this is gonna be hard to update while having homework and studying, but I'll do my best. I hope I can make chapters longer and longer, don't wanna keep you waiting when final twist comes, I'm still not sure about the outcome. Well, I'll solve that later. That's it for now!**

_**Chapter 8:**_

_**Rescue plan; Smart choice**_

_**or a horrible mistake?**_

* * *

**Saturday, November 16th, 10:29 a.m. - DWMA**

The morning after first night of festival, and also kidnap of Tachiko, was everything but calm.

Kidd was still in Dispensary because Stein thought it was strange he had constant headaches. Liz and Patty brought Stein what he wanted; all medicines he's been using to calm down his headache lately. There were normal aspirins and bottle of medicine Yoshiki gave him.

The mentioned adult meister was now in Death Room, explaining situation to Lord Death and Spirit, who was, as usual, by Grim Reaper's side.

"Kidd is going to be alright, as long as I see what is with his constant headaches. He's asleep in Dispensary as we speak. Last night I asked his weapons to bring me medicines he was using for headache. They brought me common aspirins which I highly doubt caused anything. What is second thing they brought, is definitely the cause. I haven't analyzed it yet, but I'll tell you as soon as I do" Stein explained, fixing his glasses "And about Tachiko, portal left a frequency we will easily be able to follow but first we need to make a plan."

"That's good to hear." Lord Death replied in serious voice, but with note of his usual cheery voice in it.

Meanwhile, Maka, Soul, Tsubaki and Black*Star were in Maka's apartment. Black*Star and Tsubaki were telling them what happened last evening.

"Alright, but how does Giriko fit into this all? I mean, we haven't seen him since… Attack on Arachnophobia" Blonde meister asked ((P.S., even if fanfiction doesn't follow manga or anime completely, references like Soul's scar will be scattered across it, I will not bother to explain more))

"I don't know, he definitely has some kind of relation with freaks who planned it all up, I mean, not that Giriko has a brain nor guts to do that alone!" Black*Star replied in his usual voice.

"Black*Star is right, there needs to be someone else pulling the strings…" Soul agreed, leaning to sofa "But who?"

As they spoke, Kidd had just woken up, and just as he did a headache started beating his head almost instantly, first bit easier but stronger and stronger by seconds passing. Except, this time pain wasn't only ongoing in head; it started to cover more of his body. Mira Nygus was present in room as well, she noticed that young Shinigami was awake by sound of him quietly grunting.

"Oh, Good Morning Kidd-kun." She said while approaching him

"Morning…" Boy replied, sitting up, trying to hide fact that his head along with limbs and stomach ached.

"Professor should soon arrive- ah, Good Morning Stein" Mira said seeing Stein walk into room.

Rin was currently in mansion in outskirts of city; The house of Yakari family. He was on balcony of his room, petting a cat that climbed there. Because of his calm personality and wavelength, animals knew there's no fear that he'll attack them.

He was still thinking of that from last night. He sighed and decided to go to place that never ceased to help him; library. He gone back inside and after a quick "bye" to one of maids who were also his babysitters. Before she could protest, he was already out of mansion, heading for DWMA.

* * *

**11:53 a.m. - ?**

Tachiko woke up to sound of chainsaw rumbling. After she realized what it was she felt herself almost unconsciously try to escape as far away as it's possible.

But she couldn't. She felt her arms won't move, only thing she succeeded to do is to do a sound like chain shackling.

A voice came from left corner of room: "Good, you're finally awake.."

She looked even though it was needless, she knew it was Giriko.

Giriko was standing at upper left corner of room, leaned to wall with one of his legs up with chainsaw blades on it. Blades disintegrated into light and gone back into his leg.

Tachiko felt anger build up in her just by looking at him and his usual careless expression. The fact that she was chained down also was making a visible effect on it.

"The hell do you want!?" she shouted in anger, leaning forward a bit in her sitting position, but chains restraining her from doing anything more.

"You'll see soon" he replied almost completely calmly. "After the ones who said they want ya here arrive…"

Tachiko continued to glare at him, still shouting in angry voice "And who are exactly 'they'? And why me?!"

"Calm down, yelling ain't gonna help you.." he replied, now with more annoyed tone, walking towards doors that were on the other side of room. "You'll see soon, I'm not going to explain it to a kiddo such as you…"

He then left, leaving Tachiko completely alone. When he left, she started to calm down. She given up on trying to break chains or squirm away on any way, she just sat back down and leaned to wall behind her. She then inspected the room more closely.

There wasn't even a window to begin with, only light source was a small light bulb hanging from ceiling, so the lighting wasn't very good and the dark room seemed indistinct. The walls were made out of stone, at sight probably very thick. There was nothing there but few chairs, cold stone floor and wooden doors through what Giriko left just a few moments ago.

She started to recall what happened last night. She felt the pain in back of head which she ignored until now, it was nothing big, pain probably wore out after night.

She soon remembered everything… One second seeing everything perfectly calm, Lord Death was having his speech, she was talking with Black*Star, looking at forest surrounding the part of city. She felt something hit her in back of head. That was Giriko, she assumed what hit her was a baseball bat, but it was hard to describe what hit her because pain almost instantly started to become numb.

She saw her vision blurring and felt Giriko swiftly wrap one arm around her stomach and probably running. She saw only a few things after that. She saw a fluff of blue hair closing in, that was Black*Star, soon after that she saw a pair of golden yellow eyes going straight at her, she knew it was Kidd, after that she felt few drops of warm liquid land on her face. She recalled sound of chainsaw a little before it, and it wasn't stopping. Soon, or she at least thought so, everything went into what seemed like glowing pink whirlpool, she felt warmness, as if the light towards the center of the whirlpool was pulling her towards itself.. She then lost consciousness again.

_"No, something is missing…"_ She thought to herself, trying to remember… The dark blue eyes flash before she passed out.

Her head shot up almost instantly at the thought of it.

_"Yoshiki! He went after Giriko and got catched into that thing too!"_ she thought, not really knowing what did she feel. Relief, panic or more anger heating up inside her. she looked around the room again and tried to free herself again. What seemed like minutes passed, she hadn't given up.

After around good half an hour, she accepted the fact that it was pointless. She never felt this helpless in her entire life. As time went on her thoughts about what happened with Yoshiki just became more dark and pessimistic. She thought that he may had been left behind in that whirlpool, or that "They" found him and killed him on the spot when Giriko and her arrived with him behind, or that he is somewhere in building, being tortured. She couldn't stop it, after a while thoughts just kept coming and she couldn't deny the gigantic fear of what could had happened to her weapon. She felt few warm tears roll down her face.

She couldn't deny the possibility that Yoshiki is long dead by now and that she might soon end up like him. And Black*Star and Kidd, who knows what happened to them, how injured they are, and whose blood did she feel on her skin last night? She had no open cuts so it wasn't hers, and Giriko didn't seem to be injured even a bit, not a single bruise.

She felt more tears coming, she felt if this all was her fault. She felt like the greatest despair was pushing her down, it was winning a fight. She couldn't hold it back, the despair took over and she broke. The tears were dropping off her face, little by little soaking her clothes. She didn't care a bit. She just wanted it to end, that it's all a nightmare, that she'll wake up any moment on pillow soaked with her tears. That she'll go to school with Kidd, Liz and Patty, that Yoshiki, Maka, Soul, Black*Star and Tsubaki join them. That in DWMA's class Crescent Moon is usual lively atmosphere, with everyone else: Ox, Harvar, Kim, Jackie, Killik, Pot of Fire and Pot of Thunder, that Stein walks in and starts another day with dissection..

She didn't want anything more than another normal day.. Before she could try to fight it back, she started to drift off.

* * *

**Death Room - 12:50 a.m.**

Lord Death, Stein and Spirit were in Death Room, discussing the rescue plan, though, Azusa seemed to be confused. Why such a fuss over saving one student? She, of course, wasn't going to just keep mouth shut about it, so she asked Lord Death.

"You see…" he sighed "Tachiko, the student that was kidnapped, is adopted younger sister of Kidd. Twelve years ago a team was on mission to investigate newest surprise attack of Kishin clan called 'The East Demise', they attacked a village on the East shore of Honshuu. They are known to leave no survivors. But this time it was different. The team heard baby crying and soon found a female baby under rubble of one of houses. It's the student we're talking about. After it was heard that one person survived, people thought that the most feared clan is starting to get weak. And really, nobody heard even a word about clan after. They just disappeared. But I believe that they are ones who kidnapped her, and that they have something more dangerous for others, than revenge prepared for her. So it's not only about Kid, but also about safety of other citizens."

"How can you be so sure?" Azusa continued

"Because, we couldn't get in track of her parents, even in corpses. She might had not been the child of two citizens after all" he replied. "Now, let's get back to plan, we need your soul perception ability for it. I suppose you know Giriko's the soul response."

"Fella from Lowell Village? Yes, I do" she replied.

"Good" he replied.

"We marked the spot from where portal appeared. We need you to track it down before track starts to fade." Stein continued, fixing his glasses

"Alright." Azusa replied.

* * *

Kidd was in infirmary, accompanied by his weapons.

"Feeling any better Kidd?" Liz asked, still with easily heard note of worry in her voice.

"Yeah, I'm better." He replied with a small smile. After Stein researched what the "medicine" Yoshiki gave him, he found out it was full of toxins that were making his nerves produce false "danger" signals to the brain which usually send pain as well. He gave him antidote, though it's not perfect, it stops aching for a while.

"Professor said he's working on permanent cure, but until then, I've got to drink this every hour.." He holds up the bottle with antidote

Liz sighed in relief while Patty jump hugged him when he set the bottle down. She was extremely glad her meister is okay.

Though Kidd couldn't lie, he was still very worried about Tachiko. He hid it with smile, though it wasn't exactly the fake one. He was glad that everyone else is okay.

The door of Dispensary suddenly opened. It was clear who it was, though they didn't recognize him;

It was Rin.


	9. To Believe Or Not To Believe?

**A/N: Hello, this is again me! First of all, **_**WARNING**__** for this chapter. It may contain violence and descriptions of images that some people might find disturbing**_**. Anyways, I've been having problems to decide what'll happen from here on, so sorry if updates take a longer time. And also, it's time when first exams this semester start coming so, ****ごめんなさい****! ("I'm sorry" on Japanese, if you were wondering)**

_**Chapter 9: **_

_**To Believe,**_

_**Or Not To Believe?**_

* * *

**Saturday, November 16th, 02:35 p.m. - DWMA**

Rin was standing at doors in his usual gloomy manner, glaring at weapons and meister for a second.

"D-did I arrive at wrong moment?.." He suddenly asked, breaking the silence.

Patty let go of her meister and sat back down by him.

"Not at all." Kidd replied calmly "Wait, you're the new student from the festival?" he continued examining him. He stopped seeing that he has a black glove without fingers only on right hand

"A-asymmetrical.." he did his best to hold it back so he only muttered it.

"Hm? This?" he looked at glove. "That's nothing, only a burn." He nonchalantly lied, he was sure they would know who he was and soon it would be heard around the school in the speed of light.

He saw that Liz and Kidd were looking at him with suspicious look on face, so he quickly continued.

"N-never mind, let's go back to what I wanted to tell you…" Rin continued, in bit shy sounding tone, he hesitated for a few seconds then said: "I know who kidnapped black haired girl… And where they possibly hid her…"

He knew that there was no turning back now. He told them, and if they are going to do anything abnormally stupid like ridiculous save mission right this moment, it could be his fault.

Nobody said anything, Kidd just glared at him, obviously thinking if he should trust him.

"How can we know that you're not trying to put us on a wild goose chase?" Liz asked

"Think a little, I never did anything to harm you and besides.. Your adopted sister was my first friend.."

"How do you know-" Kidd asked but was almost immediately interrupted

"Please.. It was obvious when you think about it more carefully… I saw how much you cared for that girl. I watched a bit from distance. You two lacked intimacy, so you she wasn't your girlfriend, but you two were still too close to be just friends or best friends.. Next thought was that she was your sister, but she didn't have too much similarities to you except hair color and pale skin.. Most important, she lacked Sanzu Stripes" he continued in a calm, colorless tone, "Only opinion is that she's your adopted sister. But let's leave that aside, your sister was kidnapped by a clan called 'The East Demise', I believe they are keeping her somewhere in forest West of city, there is a partly underground shelter, she must be there. But don't do anything stupid, tell that to professors or principal," he turned on his heel to exit, putting hands in pocket "Because if you go alone, you're dead for sure.. Just like her weapon partner that jumped in after her probably already is…" He was almost at doors when he straightened up from his usually bit crooked stance "Oh right, one more thing.." He turned his head towards Kidd, Dead Grey looking straight into Golden Irises, Kidd felt coldness. "Think twice before going after her at all.. You may not like the explanation…" he then turned back to doors and grabbed doorknob.

Just second before he walked out, Kidd shot up from what seemed like he was in trans. "Hey, wait up!" he said in an angry voice "Y-you know more! Come back here and spit it out, damn you!"

Rin stopped the second young Shinigami spoke. He grinned with his head bowed, bangs covering his eyes. "You'll see… All due in time.." He walked out, ignoring the confused faces of weapons and meister.

After a few seconds Kidd regained himself and quickly gone to hallway before Liz could stop him; No one was there.

_"This makes no sense, he left merely seconds ago.." _He thought to himself before going back in, sitting back on bed. He was thinking about Rin's soul response.

His soul was calm, careless one. It was a harmless one, but still, somehow too calm. What worried him is the fact that the second he spoke last words he felt his response change drastically in split second. From calm and collected to similar to one affected by strong madness radiation. It gone to aggressive one, the coldness felt in his wavelength became three times stronger response like one of a maniac. Like a witch released a Soul Protect. And teeth Kidd saw when he grinned, they were pointy like ones of a Kishin.

_"The change was so drastical…"_ he thought _"Is he really a person to trust?"_

* * *

**02:49 a.m. - ?**

Tachiko was sitting in similar room as before, she woke up around three hours earlier and first thing she noticed was that this room had a window, though small, it was enough to let in some moonlight. It was enough to see that on right wall were written a few Kanji written with red fluid what seemed like blood. They read "Join us, Madness awaits". Even if it was pretty disturbing at first because it seemed like it's fresh, after less than a minute she didn't mind it anymore.

She had bags under eyes, she looked around room, she was still chained down but this time only by leg and chain was longer, but not long enough that she could reach the doors. On one of chairs was now a sandwich and a glass of water. She didn't gone to eat, she just listened for something to break the deaf silence.

She inspected every corner of the room she could get to and Waited… Waited… Waited… She gave up on hope that someone will come before she falls asleep again.

She was walking around the room aimlessly for about a hour already. She wasn't alone for such a long time. She'd even accept if Giriko came in to check on her, even if "they" arrived already. She already accepted the thought that Yoshiki is dead as if it's a fact.

_"The time passes so slowly, it's almost if there's no 'time'…" _she thought as she continued to walk _"If that's how it is, they can keep me here as long as they want… I don't care…"_

The time passed and the routine as the last time happened, she felt a painful income of guilt, though it was much less strong than last time and fell asleep shortly after it.

* * *

What seemed like days to her passed, she changed at least 8 rooms, she'd fall asleep and wake up in new one, each one more open and less restraining, but with more messages written in red fluid. Who knows, maybe the ones who were here before wrote it. She didn't eat anything even though every time she woke up in new room, Giriko or someone else who was taking care of her, would leave food.

She was now in a big room with three small windows and whole wall covered in writings in red fluid, all basically the same: "Join us", "This is madness..", "No point to resist any further", "Goodbye", etc.

The room was still made of stone and more cold than any room before, and there were two corpses on ground. One that clearly committed suicide by stabbing itself in abdomen and slitting its wrists with a sharp object, maybe a shattered plate, a long ago. It was leaned against a wall, with words written above it: "There's no point in staying here any longer."

Second one was bit more recent, also a suicide committer. He or she was obviously fed up with being there, or out of shock after seeing other corpse, which was more disturbing when person saw it, apparently, too worried about how he or she will end. The person killed itself by banging head against now broken mirror, that now laid shattered and bloodstained on ground.

Tachiko wasn't startled by it. Heck, she barely noticed. Only thing she did was draw a target on wall with blood of other victim and practice throwing with bone of the first. She had colorless and cold expression like Rin's now. She was throwing bone around for good hour after she broke it with her bare hands, seemingly bored.

She didn't say anything for hours. She forgot that there are people outside she knew and called friends, or she just didn't bother thinking about them at all. She didn't tire herself with blaming self or anyone else for what happened. Her mind was empty, her clothes were torn up, eyes were dull-looking but still characteristically emerald green, skin was pale as paper, hair complete mess and she even started getting hallucinations not long ago.

She was currently painting walls with blood, mumbling something to herself and a from time to time quietly chuckling on a disturbing way. She wasn't restrained at all anymore, she could also leave the room by simply knocking down doors using what's in room, but she didn't seem to want to.

In reality, only a day and a half passed since she woke up there for the first time, but time seemed to pass much slower wherever she was trapped, and she had no idea what was happening outside of that prison she was in, even though she didn't look at it that way anymore.

* * *

Meanwhile, back in Death City, many things changed, especially in Gallows Mansion.

Liz and Patty were ordered to keep Kidd at home because he ignored Rin's warning and rushed into forest. It was even more lonely with Mansion almost always empty, only Kidd in there. Fortunately, (or unfortunately) Grim Reaper let him be a part of rescue team.

It was sure that Grim Reaper was sure in his suspicions and is not taking any risks. The rescue team were previously mentioned Young Shinigami and his weapons, Liz and Patty, Maka and her partner Soul, Tsubaki and Black*Star. They are followed by Deathscythes Azusa, Spirit, Justin and graduated meister Stein. Rin was also following one in group because Liz spilled out that he knows something useful right next time her and Patty gone to report to Shinigami.

**A/N: Alright, a short preview of next chapter - they'll find Tachiko and return her back to city, but the question is, is it really a good idea?**

**Thank you for reading, Review so I can see what I need to work on or just a compliment if you have one! Favorite is you like the story enough to… favorite it. And Follow to stay updated!**


	10. Rescue MissionIs That Really My Sister?

**A****/N: Hello, again me! I know I'm getting annoying but it's my job. :P I hope you're enjoying the Fanfiction so far, mind spreading it if you do? :3 **_**WARNING:**__**The fanfiction will might get a bit weird or more gory from now on, I don't know. So, it's a major warning for younger readers.**_

_**Chapter 10:**_

_**Rescue Mission;**_

_**Is that really my sister?**_

* * *

**Tuesday, November 18th, 03:27 a.m. - Forest**

The rescue team was walking trough forest, it was deaf silence broken by sounds and tunes produced by night birds or someone stepping on a branch or dry leafs.

Justin Law, seventeen year old Deathscythe was listening to loud music on his earphones, but still was wary if any possible trap was to activate.

Black*Star was unusually silent. Tachiko was only one who wanted to train with him and accept his big ego. He was fully concentrated on mission, so was his weapon, Tsubaki, currently transformed into Kusurigama.

Soul was thinking, also in his weapon form, he obviously had a same bad feeling as Deathscythe held by Stein, Spirit.

Kidd was wielding two pistols, Thompson sisters. He was trying to stay focused. He was worried about his adopted sister. He looked over to Rin a few times, still feeling a bit angry at him.

Maka, Azusa and Stein were occupied by trying to sense any soul response. They had no luck; just a few responses from souls of animals and people from group.

Stein gave a Rin questioning look after a while, but did not say anything, it was clear he had a same question as Kidd did two days ago in infirmary. It was strange, almost worrying that his soul is radiating such coldness. It was too calm, and kind of indistinct, hard to sense.

Rin saw the questioning glares of two meisters but ignored them. He knew well why he was here, he had other reason to tag along than just to save his friend, and whatever reason it was, he did not bother telling it to anyone.

"Wait." He suddenly said, "We're close.. Building she's in is close.. And the forcefield is the trap.." he looked up and continued, "It takes souls of anyone who gets in contact with it… Actually…" He walked over to Kidd, who looked at him with suspicion "You are barely centimeters from it.." he continued as he pushed him away from it.

"How can you know that? It's not like you're a pro or something. You're just the new kid who tagged along cause you 'know' something we don't!" Black*Star said in his cocky tone, with a note of anger and disbelief in it.

"I have a proof.." Rin replied in calm voice. "You see, the forcefield is right here, only a few millimeters in front of me" he continued, pulling up left hand, one without glove and reaching in front of him. A few sparkles like electric ones are seen and his hand suddenly freezes on one spot for a few seconds, an electric charge was seen to go up to his elbow. He winced and immediately after that he was launched back a meter and a half. He shook his hand and grunted quietly.

"You see… It didn't take my soul, it only blew me back.. That's because ones who kidnapped your friend and set this barrier and my parents are related.. I believe my grandfather and the leader of this organization did 'The Blood Brothers' ritual as kids, a.k.a., they traded a few drops of blood…" He said while putting his hand back into pocket "My grandfather definitely found a way to store it in family mark… Watch closely.."

He put the other hand, one with glove on same spot he put the other one. Again a few sparkles were seen, a three pedestal flower in a thin circle glowed on upper side of his hand and a small hole appeared, they seen a stone wall a few meters away that wasn't there before

"See? That's basically almost another dimension, and I'm key to it.. The trick is that those few drops of blood stored in family mark change my wavelength a little when it radiates from my hand." he said as the hole expanded, revealing more of big, grey stone building. "Now, let's go.."

In a few seconds hole grew big enough for two people to enter at once. They all entered two by two and last was Rin, after he removed the hand the hole closed instantly, first few steps he just stumbled. He saw the confused and bit worried look that young blonde meister sent him.

"It also depletes my wavelength, taking away some of my energy… It's nothing to worry about.." He said, straightening back up.

The moon was suddenly high up on sky, like clock just struck midnight. Trees around them had stems that looked withered and had leaves in weird dark colors that looked more like pedestals, most of them were bluish purple. The building in front of them was made out of stone, and shaped like a stair pyramid.

"We're going to split up.. The building is huge and it's possible we're never going to get it done, even if time passes differently… Here's always midnight and one hour outside is here like roughly 24 hours. You decide groups yourself, but I think it'd be better is I teamed up with Grim Reaper's son." He said while pointing to Kidd with his thumb.

Nobody seemed to be question what he told, or better said, ordered them.

* * *

They went in pairs, each one with a person who could sense wavelengths. Maka and Black*Star (accompanied by Soul and Tsubaki), Justin and Azusa, Spirit and Stein, and last one, Rin and Kidd (with Thompson sisters).

Rin then gave each team a little device.

"This is only way we'll communicate. It's almost as a walkie-talkie, but a bit different. If you find Tachiko, click the green one, if you found her weapon partner click blue one, if you need backup click red. White is for activating microphone, so you can contact others if you found some other people or information." he explained while handing them the devices.

They split up right after they opened door, by force of course. Each team gone to investigate two floors. Rin and Kidd got the last two, 7th and 8th.

* * *

They were walking for approximately few hours with no results. Not a single soul. It was silence until Kidd broke it. He couldn't keep those questions piled up any longer.

"Rin, you said that time passes differently here. One hour outside is a day here, right?" he said in the calmest tone he could keep, counting that they were so close to finding his sister, "That means that for her it passed-"

"By my calculations, if she was kidnapped around 5 p.m. two days ago, now it's around 30 days for her, that's roughly a month.."

Kidd felt a bit of guilt, even if it was almost none of his fault. He looked down to Rin, who was because of his a bit hunched shape a little lower than him. Young Shinigami continued only after a few seconds:

"How do you know all those things? Related to this place and your family?"

"Logical conclusions, I've had a lot practice at it. And my family is pretty well known.. All I had to is look at the school and home library for a bit. Most of it is stuff that passes on from generation to generation" he replied smoothly. He did not mind him asking even personal questions. He replied to everything in monotone.

After a bit of hesitation again, Kidd spoke again "What was that when you appeared at Dispensary? Your soul response changed so drastically.."

"Let's call it an extremely strong bipolar disorder.."

_" 'Let's call it'?"_ Kidd thought with a bit of confusion and suspiciousness, needless to say, he continued

"And you never call me by my real name? I doubt you don't know it by now.." he said

"Because it would be too casual. You are an important person after all. You're son of Grim Reaper, and I'm just a son of 'famous' politicians in Japan" he said, saying the word "famous" with voice full of bitterness and disgust, he continued with same tone, looking a bit to side, away from Kidd with his hands in pockets "Famous my ass… It's a bother, nothing more-"

They both suddenly stopped. It seems that they had both sensed same thing- another presence. Rin sensed a change in atmosphere and heard a dim chain shackle, Kidd felt a soul response down the hall, one he knew so well; It was Tachiko.

Kidd hurried, feeling happiness knowing that she's alive but Rin grabbed his shoulder.

"Wait… I need to warn you.. She could had been alone all the time, we don't know in what condition is she."

Kidd felt like he fell back onto the ground from clouds. Only now he noticed how much response changed.

They carefully walked up to doors from where Kidd felt the response. Rin could just open the doors. They were rusty and it was clear that they weren't locked or made to prevent anything or anyone from staying in the room or out of it.

Rin just touched the handle and pushed doors for barely a millimeter when they just fell down. A cold breeze greeted them as they walked in. Kidd quietly gasped and his eyes widened, like he's not believing in what he's seeing. Liz, still in her weapon form, let out a muffled cry. Patty, also in her weapon form, almost immediately covered her eyes. Rin just winced at the sight of what was in room.

Walls of room were now completely covered in writings written in red fluid. The floor wasn't any better; they were greeted by rotting carnage, some would even say bloodbath. There were dozens of corpses on ground, most of them presumably killed not long ago. The rest of furniture in room were no better; destroyed, partly crushed, shattered and splattered with blood, some even with body parts over them.

Though it was almost complete darkness in room, moonlight coming from one of windows was making it easier to see few things. At the opposite wall Tachiko sat cross-legged, with her head bowed down and arms behind back, at same spot almost same to one on what she first woke up. Kidd walked up to her carefully, with relief and fear at same time. Rin lighted up candle he was carrying with him and followed Kidd.

At approximately two meters away from her Tachiko's head shot up like she heard a gunshot. They had a clear view at her face now;

Her skin was pale as paper, her clothes, the uniform she was usually wearing, was ripped at several parts and stained with blood mostly at sleeves, her hands were stained with blood too. She had a few wounds that were apparently self inflicted; bruises and deep bitemarks. Her eyes were wide opened as if she's frightened, the expression on her face shown same; fear.

Rin bit shakily pressed green button while Kidd took the candle and approached closer to her.

While he tried to convince her that they came there only to help, blue button lighted up and few quiet words were heard.

Rin sighed after he said a few quiet words into microphone himself. "Good, they found Yoshiki, he's alive and well.. They are coming here to help. How're you doing with her Kidd?"

Tachiko then seemed to calm down. Mention of Yoshiki's name like it brought her back to reality.

"K…Kidd?.." she said wile glaring at him, she then carefully looked at Rin. She finally saw his face "Rin..?"

After few long seconds she suddenly quickly leaned forward hugging Kidd who was kneeled in front of her. He hugged her back. He felt happiness. Tachiko and Yoshiki are almost safe. He ignored carnage around them and put all priorities to comforting his little sister.

* * *

Azusa and Justin soon arrived. Kidd took off his jacket and placed it on Tachiko's shoulders then picked her up, who fell asleep in meanwhile, and carried her on his back. Liz and Patty were walking behind them. They exited building and were greeted by Stein, Spirit, Maka, Soul, Black*Star and Tsubaki.

Rin opened up portal in barrier and they left the same way they arrived. Though Kidd had been happy just a little ago, something else caught his attention. Spirit and Stein were carrying someone in Stein's lab coat. It was definitely Yoshiki, but he didn't move at all. _"Didn't Rin say they found him alive and well?" _Kidd asked himself. But upon better inspection, he felt his soul response, though weak, it was still there. He exhaled the breath he didn't know he was holding.

Rin had his hands again in his pockets and look glued to ground, It was clear he was still in shock. He knew that there was a source radiating madness somewhere in building, but did not expect such results in only 30 days.

The sun was slowly rising above Death City as they closed in… The morning was coming.

* * *

**A/N: Well, that's it for now! But it isn't over just yet, we've got a long way to go (I hope). I'll see you next time. PEACE!**


	11. Recovery

**A/N: This is me again, I'm trying to make this interesting and descriptive but I'm maybe sometimes not succeeding.. Or doing grammar mistakes. Well, that's it. I already sent blood and gore warnings. If you want to send fan character shipping later on (Between Rin, Yoshiki or Tachiko, Kidd can also be involved), review and I'll see what I can do. Also sorry for putting a lot of titles as questions, it's kinda hard to think of another way**

* * *

_**Chapter 11:**_

_**Recovery, Hard Or**_

_**Impossible?**_

**Tuesday, November 18th, 11:48 a.m. - Dispensary**

Tachiko was lying in one of beds, still asleep. Meanwhile, Stein was explaining the situation to Kidd because he demanded, and Stein thought it'd be better if someone told him now.

"She's _physically_ almost okay. A few bruises and bitemarks are nothing to worry about, the blow in back of head isn't really a problem anymore.. Though there is a problem." he said while fixing his glasses "She was, I'm sure you felt, in a room in what was almost as cold as in refrigerator, she was hypothermic. Also, she didn't eat for quite a long time." he made a stop and looked at Tachiko "… Also her mind is a mess.. She was isolated for a month and, as Rin told me earlier, there was a source radiation madness somewhere in building… It's hard to say if she'll recover.. It wasn't really a huge ordeal, but she didn't have to experience that before, right?"

"Yeah…" Kidd quietly agreed, looking down "Before, she'd be terrified just to look at blood… And when we found her, the room looked like a genocide happened… Blood was on walls, on broken furniture, everywhere… There were even insides, body parts.. It had a foul smell, her hands were even bloody, but she looked as if she was scared of us more.."

"Well, we'll have to see what happens. Rin will go with us to identify those corpses later." Stein said then gone to doors "I'll leave you two alone, I have to update to Lord Death and Spirit.." He said before leaving.

Kidd just sat on a chair by Tachiko's bed, blankly staring at her, hoping she'll soon wake up. He gave up after a while and put his face in his hands. He just wanted it all to disappear, that he could forget what he saw yesterday… The carnage… The face of his sister that didn't even recognize him.. He felt mixed feelings build up… Guilt towards himself, sympathy towards Tachiko and deep disgust towards people who did it in the first place.

Tachiko then started to stir, he looked up to her and saw sweat on her forehead; she was having a nightmare. By the second, she started to move more, like she's fighting something. Kidd tried to wake her up and after a few seconds she shot up in bed, her eyes opening wide the same second as cold sweat dripped down her face. She started to tear up and almost instantly started crying.

Kidd didn't know what to do, but it was painful to even see her like that. He pulled her close and hugged her tightly. He felt her tears slowly soaking his uniform as they dripped onto his shoulder.

_"That's it.."_ he thought _"Those monsters will pay… I'll make them, even if that's the last thing I'll do.." _he swore to himself as his heart filled with rage.

* * *

**12:25 a.m. - DWMA Halls**

Kidd finally managed to calm down Tachiko, who was now again lightly sleeping in Dispensary while Liz and Patty were watching over her and waiting for Yoshiki to wake up. School was still full with students. As Kidd passed, he heard them whisper:

"What happened to that black haired girl?"

"They said she's in infirmary.."

"Miki told me she gone insane…"

"That's probably why we aren't allowed to the infirmary."

"I always knew she was a nutjob.." she continued, whispering, "And she always hangs out with Kidd, what does she think? That she's something special? She's only a crazo… "

Kidd almost unnoticeably winced at that last remark, anger in him started boiling up again.

"Hm? What is it Shinigami boy?" The same girl looked at him, with a tone that was insincerely sweet. She had long dark blue hair tied up in a high ponytail. She wore short skirt, top that leaved her belly exposed and a thin jacket. Her name was Tsuki (Kanji: 月, meaning: Moon)

"The point in talking behind someone's back is that that someone doesn't hear you.." He said in the calmest tone he could.

She was confused at first then said "So what? Are you telling me that you know what happened to that puny brat?"

"Yes, and it's none of your business, so I suggest you keep your mouth shut." he said, narrowing his eyes

She wasn't used to being talked to like that, especially not from someone she liked that much, she quietly growled as he walked away.

He couldn't care less about what he just said. He just kept on walking, he needed to calm his mind.

After a while, he saw Rin walking trough crowd in hallway, he was crooked forward a little as usual with his bangs covering eyes and hands in pockets; he apparently just came back from inspection of that building they found Tachiko in.

Kidd remembered something and rushed trough crowd after him, bell ringed and hallway started emptying, leaving the two alone. Rin stopped walking and turned his head and looked over shoulder to Kidd.

"What is it?" He said in tired tone, like he's bored.

"You know well what I want to ask you.." Kidd said while walking towards him, note of anger in his voice was easily heard. "You know more about monsters that kidnapped and killed all those people.. The same monsters that captured Tachiko and Yoshiki.. Tell me all you know!"

"I'm not making that same mistake again.." Rin replied in calm tone that even more angered Kidd; how can he still be that calm after all that happened?

"You remember," he continued, turning to him and raising his look, "last time I warned you, you ignored it as if you didn't even care. If your weapons and professor didn't stop you on time, you'd soul be in hands of those monsters you speak of.."

"I don't care, you're taking this far too lightly-"

"-And you too harshly.. I see in your eyes, you're planning to get information out of me, then head to another foolish and pointless alone revenge mission.."

At this point Kidd was fed up with Rin's attitude, he rushed at Rin, grabbing him by neck and holding him against wall. Rin still didn't seem to care even a bit, he just kept coldly looking into his eyes.

"And what do you plan on doing now? The truth is that you're just helpless now.." Rin continued, "You'd now beat the living hell out of me, but you can't, you don't have strength to.. You feel as if you're good for nothing…"

"Shut up!" Kidd yelled

"Don't think I don't know the feeling.." he said while bowing his head down again "But, I did a mistake when I felt like that once… And I don't want you to do the same one" he said as he grabbed the young Shinigami's wrist and squeezing it hard, making him let go.

"After all," he said standing up again "You don't want to lose a part of yourself as I did," he looked up to him again, grinning with same sharp teeth, one eye was hidden under bangs, seen only as red lowing dot and other wide open with a psychotic look "Do you..?"

Kidd flinched. He felt same wavelength change as that time in infirmary. He stepped back and made distance between the two.

"The mistake impossible erase much less, correct… Lose a part of yourself and someone else taking over it… That's the slavery of your own soul…" Rin continued, still staring at Black haired meister but his grin fading from face "It's almost like Insanity, like Black Blood… Implanted inside you and using your body as it pleases… 'Sleep tight,' it says… 'I'll take care of all your worries', it's the sentence that you hear, the curse of my family that I made stronger on myself with that one mistake…"

Kidd then felt like coldness around Rin impaled him in chest, he stumbled to wall and held place where it impaled him but nothing; He only felt his jacket. When he opened eyes, he saw Rin walking up to him with worried look on face.

"Are you alright?" He said while helping him up.

Kidd didn't respond, he was still in a bit of a shock from what he saw. When Rin realized he won't get an answer, he spoke again.

"So, you saw it again?.." He said, bowing his head a bit like he's uneasy or ashamed. "That's the second part of my soul, the one I made by a deal.. It speaks trough visions people around me get if my wavelength breaks into close contact with theirs.."

"A-a deal?" Kidd finally spoke, looking at Rin.

He just sighed "Yes, a deal.." He then looked up and turned on his heel "I'll tell you later, just somewhere where there nobody can hear us or interrupt.." he started walking

Kidd Just nodded and followed, he didn't care if it was a trap, the curiosity was killing him.

* * *

When they got to a lonely hall between ground floor and basement, Rin spoke again

"Alright, as I promised, here's the story.." he said while looking slightly other way, "When I was four, I lost a friend important to me. I felt alone and like I'm missing a part of myself… One night, I snuck out of house, following a squirrel… I soon got lost in forest, I wanted to go home, when I saw a trace of dark blue sparkles. I didn't know what I'd rather do, so I followed them. After a while following it, I ran into a group of people, the tallest one kneeled on one knee in front of me.. He had purple-bluish eyes and dark skin.. He wore a grey cloth over his face that was covering from nose below.. He said: 'Sleep tight, I'll take care of all your worries' and touched my forehead, I felt myself getting sleepy, I felt coldness… Next thing I remember is waking up in my bed, back at mansion. I felt like that little hollow that emerged when I lost my friend was now filled with something else. That man, gave me a new 'friend', though it wasn't a thing to call a friend. He implanted a part of his wavelength into mine and stitched it together.. The wavelength somehow evolved to become second half of my soul.. You see, I believe that man has some kind of relation with what happened to Tachiko.. I felt same wavelength for a second when we entered the barrier in forest…" He sighed then added on: "Please, let it stay a secret, you see, I'm suspicious to enough people already…"

Kidd nodded, _"At least I know that one half of him isn't dangerous.." _he thought

"Well, I'd better get going. My parents, or better said babysitters, will get worried.." Rin said and gone upstairs to ground floor.

Kidd watched him leave and shortly after that left himself.

* * *

**01:03 p.m. - Dispensary**

Yoshiki's eyes slowly opened. He felt his body start to ache as he tried to sit up.

"Geez… What happened last night..?" he grunted and rubbed his head. He felt a bandage. "Huh?" he said as he looked down to his torso; under an unbuttoned nightshirt he saw bandages. At that moment doors opened and Mira Nygus walked in.

"Great, you woke up. How're you feeling?" she said

"Like I've been run over by a bus.." He replied

"I see… Professor expected it so he asked me to give you some painkillers" she continued while putting a small bottle of pills on nightstand by him.

"Thank you" He replied with a small smile

"Well, I'd better report to professor Stein that you've woken up." she said with an almost unnoticeable smile. She then turned and left the room

Yoshiki looked around infirmary a bit, his look stopped at bed by his. When he realized that Tachiko is in infirmary too, not here to visit him but hurt. His eyes widened a little at that thought, he tried getting up but he felt his leg hurt badly. He glanced over to it and saw that his right trouser leg was lifted and his leg was bandaged; it was clear he broke it.

_"Great.."_ he thought, while still trying to go closer to her bed. He somehow managed to get to side of her bed. He ignored the pain from his wounds and took a closer look at Tachiko; even though she was soundly sleeping, she seemed exhausted. She had bandages on her hands up to half way to her elbows, her skin was paler than usual and to young weapon's horror, sort of cold.

_"She couldn't be… She still has a pulse…" _He thought to himself, though he was still worried. He had no memory of what happened two days ago, or how he thought, merely hours ago.

Who knows for how long he was sitting there, holding his hand on hers. He held it more for his own comfort, as long as he feels the pulse, he knows she's alive. The doors suddenly opened and Kidd walked in.

* * *

**A/N: Sorry for late updating, I'm doing as fast as I can.. So yeah, that's all for now. Peace out!**


	12. Emerging Chaos

**A/N: Hey, again me with a new chapter. Look guys, I'm sorry I updated this late, I had a lot of work for school and** **honestly, I didn't know what to write, I ran out of ideas.. Anyways, I made cover for the fanfiction, now just to figure out how to set it… Well, enjoy! **_**Reminder: We left off when Kidd walked into Dispensary about recovering information from Rin. He saw Yoshiki by Tachiko's bed. Now let's see what will happen..**_

_**Chapter 12:**_

_**Emerging Chaos**_

* * *

**Tuesday, November 18th, 01:34 p.m. - Dispensary**

Yoshiki raised his look from his asleep meister, still holding her hand. Kidd was standing at Dispensary doorway, looking at two; it was clear to see he was still a bit irritated by other students' reactions on his sister's sudden disappearance and sudden appearance in infirmary and what he heard from Rin; The more he thought about both, the more it was budging him.

"Oh, hi Kidd.." Yoshiki said, breaking the silence that seemed to last forever. Gold eyes locked into deep blue.

"Good to see you've finally woken up.." Kidd replied, faking a calm tone, "So, how're you feeling?"

"Not bad, just a few smaller wounds and a broken leg." Yoshiki said, putting on a small grin.

Kidd's look slowly lowered; Yoshiki's chest was almost completely covered with bandages.

"That doesn't look like nothing.." he said.

"It's hard to say actually when it doesn't hurt as much." Yoshiki replied, still looking at him.

Kidd's look fell onto the bed Tachiko was lying on. The calm expression diffused like a breath cloud at cold weather, slowly changing into look of worry, the silence once again seemed like it lasted forever. Yoshiki seemingly interpreted the expression well. He looked down, to the side. Pain could be felt in air.

"H-hey Kidd, I wanted to ask you something.." Yoshiki said, again breaking the silence, slightly looking back up to him with one eye shadowed out under his uneven bangs. "What happened while I was out?"

Kidd sighed, clearly avoiding the answer, he sat down on bed left to Tachiko's, he had his head slightly bowed down and closed eyes. Yoshiki was stubbornly looking at him. W hen young Shinigami accepted the fact that he won't give up, no matter how much he delays it,

"Tachiko got kidnapped" he replied quietly, opening eyes to half but still avoiding eye contact with brown haired weapon, "It was just when father announced that festival started… Giriko appeared out of nowhere, knocked out Tachiko and ran backwards, into some kind of portal… Professor Stein, You, Black*Star and I chased him, you're the only one who managed to enter the portal after Giriko before it closed… Your soul responses disappeared the second portal had closed.." he took a second before continuing, his look was still glued to ground,

"Yesterday, we found you two.. You were found by Professor Stein and Deathscythe Spirit, I couldn't exactly see what kinds of wounds you had, but I suppose they weren't too bad.. Tachiko was though, in much worse shape… Mentally" he quickly added on, seeing Yoshiki's extremely worried expression, "Fortunately she wasn't seriously injured, she was soon fast asleep and Giriko was nowhere to be found.." he finished, closing his eyes again.

Yoshiki's expression was practically unreadable at this point. Worry, fear, confusion; but the most recognizable, shock. His look was flying trough room; To Tachiko, then to Kidd, after that to doors or window, repeatedly.

"But, I have a question for you too.." Kidd said, his eyes were shadowed out, his voice was cold "What was that headache medicine you gave me after street attack?"

"What are you talking about? What medicine?" Yoshiki looked back at him

"Don't lie.." Kidd wasn't giving up, "You gave me some amber colored liquid that you said is 'good for headaches'.. Professor Stein analyzed it and it was some kind of poison that sends fake danger signals trough body, causing pain and short feel of relief after taking it… I've practically drugged myself, thinking it would help.."

"I ain't give you any damn medicine!" Yoshiki replied staring at Kidd with eyes wide opened, trace of hysteria was easily heard in his voice and seen on his face.

"You cannot hide it!" Kidd replied with angry yell, shooting his head back up, staring right into young weapon's eyes "I clearly remember it you giving it to me, here in this room! Even Tachiko could confirm that you gave it to me!"

"How the hell would I give it to you, I was in my dorm whole freaking day!" Yoshiki yelled

"You weren't in the dorm, you said you were going to Tachiko and just disappeared! Crona told me she was in dorm, checking where were you! You got her worried and just disappeared until the situation calmed down, you coward!" Kidd continued furiously.

"Oh, so you think you know better what I done than I do myself?!" Yoshiki with a sneer, his look and voice was almost pure hysteria by now.

"I do, because you seemingly don't have a brain to memorize it with!" Kidd replied

"Why you little-" Yoshiki swung his fist, Kidd did the same.

"Stop it…" a cold voice suddenly spoke

Both froze, seemingly somewhere between startle and shock, they didn't even realize that what they wasn't each other but cold, pale skin.

Tachiko was sitting between with her eyes shadowed out. She blocked hits by catching their fists. Her cold touch gave them chills down their spines.

Nobody moved for a while.

"T-Tachiko.." Kidd spoke but was immediately cut off by young female's cold voice again.

"Stop it…" She repeated, tightening grip on their fists with her nails slightly sank into their skins "I can't stand it…"

Both backed away almost at same moment. They could finally see Tachiko's eyes, they were half closed, staring down at bed with a glasslike look. Her skin was still pale with bandages on some places and she was much more skinnier than before. For some reason, to two boys, that sight was more than disturbing.

"Tachiko, a-are you alright?" Yoshiki asked when he regained himself.

"I'm fine.." Tachiko replied with a note of calmness in voice, "But I get the feeling you two aren't.."

Silence ruled the room once again, her words seemed to echo throughout. She was seemingly waiting for answer, patiently, while two boys either were still in shock or were too embarrassed by their outburst, but they couldn't deny that they were still angry at each other.

"Last thing I want to do is to tear even bigger hole in friendship between you two.. After what happened was fully my fault." she put hand up, stopping Yoshiki before he could say opposite. "It's not Yoshiki who made you drink that medicine, it was me, Black*Star wasn't one that wasn't watching out on his post, it was me…" her voice got shaky, "And most important of all, it's me who is responsible for you two getting worried and hurt… Nobody else's, but mine…" she continued, "I was afraid too, there was a great chance Yoshiki could had been dead and Kidd injured even more seriously.. And now…" she gritted her teeth and continued, though every word seemed to hurt her like a stab, "You two are fighting over something that I am responsible for…"

A few tears dripped onto bed cover, they seen color coming back into her skin. "I don't know the outcome of this, nor am I sure I want to know, but what I want is that you two stop fighting and constant suspicions!"

Kidd didn't know what he felt, it was almost same as feeling when they found her; thrill and happiness mixing with fear. He knew it was good that his sister hasn't changed, but was that all she was thinking about while she was in that building? About how things are going here but with so many pessimistic thoughts?

"We'll try our best"

"Yeah.."

She hiccoughed once and pulled them both into a hug,

"You idiots..!" she said before breaking up in tears again.

Both smiled in relief and hugged back. Her skin was warmer, she finally shown emotions, they knew she was okay, or at least going to be okay.

* * *

**02:05 - Forest**

Rin skipped last class, he headed straight to home to think things through, even though it was hard counting he had no sleep last night. The little time they had to rest after mission he spent thinking. He couldn't force himself into sleeping even if he wanted to. When he reached the mansion his family lived in he stopped. He backed up a few steps and took a close look at the building.

It was a big three floor white building, mostly made out of white marble. Pillars in corners were made of nice smooth sea-blue stones; His parents clearly weren't afraid of showing off how rich they were. But he had no interest in beautiful blue-white contrast. Something else catched his eye, one thing that was off.

Above doors, at the height of first floor, a big rhomboid shaped stone was put in the marble, made of simple dark grey stone. It seemed very old. It was hard to see, but it was definitely the family crest. He entered the house and decided to look it up in library. He went straight down the main hall then right of cafeteria. He found himself in a huge library. He dropped his bag by table and gone to "family history" marked shelf. After less than few minutes, he found it, the crest. It was Rhomboid shaped like one at entrance, in middle of it was the family mark; three pedestal flower in a thin lined circle. Right of it was a silver sword, ground was green and background light blue. Under it was a light blue puddle that was going along with the background, that meant peace. Left of it was an vertically put eye, and a blood puddle under it that seemed to be dripping either from eye or from blood red sky, the ground also seemed lifeless. He didn't have to be genius to figure out that meant madness. But something was weird, their family symbol seemed to be the link between the two.

He redrawn the symbol then put book back in its place. He picked up his bag and quietly gone upstairs to his room on first floor.

He threw bag to by his workbench and practically fell onto bed. He heard a "cling" sound as soon as bag hit the floor. He looked over to it and seen a glass shard lying by the bag. He got up and picked it up. He remembered; back at that building, when Kidd wasn't looking, he picked it up. He seen reflection of his eye in the shard. It may look just like a piece of broken glass but he seen something else… It was a communication system, just like one Shinigami uses. But this one is different, there are shards scattered all across that building, and what's important, they are all made by one and same mirror. That means, one person can watch all angles of building, at once, like security camera system.

_"But the thing is… It can be the opposite.."_ Rin thought when sitting back on bed, _"I wonder how it works though.. I can't even know if whoever set that up isn't watching me right now.."_

After a few minutes, he gave up and put shard on his bedside table. When he heard a knock at doors he quickly put it under his pillow.

It was just one of his babysitters, checking on him. He sighed and gone doing homework, he put shard back by him.

* * *

At some point, when it was already starting to get dark, shard seemed to glow for a second. He froze in place, looking at it, like he was expecting to pop out of it. He looked right into it and after a short flash of white saw a blue purplish eye staring back at him for a second. From startle he broke eye contact and after another white flash he found himself on floor, with his chair flipped to side; he fell from chair when he broke eye contact. He was still in a bit of a shock.

_"What the heck was that all about..?"_ He thought, trying to regain himself. He got up

"Young master, is everything alright?" he heard a voice from downstairs.

"Yes, I'm alright.." He replied. He picked the shard up, it was still faintly glowing. He looked at it then out the window, he saw the same glow from in between the trees. He slightly narrowed eyes and blinked a few times, but light was still there. He took the shard, quickly gone downstairs and sneaked out of house. He carefully followed the light, he proceeded deeper into forest as the shard he was holding continued to shine brighter and brighter with each step, light shining in front of him was leading him, At one point light just disappeared, though the shard he was holding was almost pulsing. He felt a breeze and his eyes widened. He turned around and seen a shadowed person; the same one that attacked Kidd, the same that gave him a piece of his soul, the same presence that he felt when they entered that stone building now filled the air.

The tall figure was hard to see. He had blue purplish eyes, uneven dark brown-red hair that was a little longer than shoulder length and partly covering his left eye. He had skin a bit lighter than Yoshiki, a grey cloth covering from nose below and black clothes.

"You…" Rin's voice sounded like it's filled with held back rage.

"Missed me?" the tall figure spoke with a deep and calm voice, though, a note of amusement and mock was heard in his voice. "By your look, I think you put the puzzle together once again, didn't you Rin?"

"You're the one behind this all, aren't you?" Rin said, now the rage was clearly seen on his face

"Me? No, I'm Their right hand.. And They were too fast for you Shibusen brats.. The apocalypse will begin, we even have new experiments.." He snapped his fingers

Black figures started to come out of darkness, tall and muscular black monsters surrounded them. Rin looked more than frightened by the sight.

"Vengeful spirits of people that killed themselves in that little prison we closed your friend in.. They of course, don't have their own will anymore. Only thing they feel is anger, rage, they have an insatiable thirst for bloodshed.. Our marionettes and army." tall figure spoke.

"You won't get away with this.. You're the monster here… The monster who I'm gonna beat senseless!" Rin hissed trough his gritted teeth and charged at him

Tall figure chuckled, he slightly narrowed his eyes and in a dark voice said "Attack the boy.. Shred him.. Feast on his lifeforce…" he then teleported away with just a snap of fingers.

"Get back over here!" Rin yelled, but soon realized monsters are closing on him; he was surrounded.

He felt himself getting overwhelmed by panic, he ran at one weakly guarded spot. but next he felt his strong punch in face and his back hitting something hard. The monster sent him flying back by a mere punch into tree that was four meters away.

He felt his nose bleeding and attempted to get up. One monster rushed at him with mouth open, revealing long razor sharp teeth. It held him against tree by neck. Rin succeeded to do a counterattack, but he knew he didn't stand a chance.. He the monsters started beating him mercilessly.

At some point, when he was close to losing consciousness, the mirror shard fell out of his pocket. Monsters almost immediately backed away.

It took him a few seconds to realize what happened, when he did, he picked up the shard and held it so the monsters can see it. He backed away slowly, limping. When he got out of their view he ran the best he could with such severe wounds.

* * *

_"To DWMA…"_ he spoke in his mind repeatedly _"I have to warn others… I have to get to DWMA before it's too late.."_

He ran trough school, ignoring students that were confused and shocked by a student practically covered in his own blood, air was piercing his lungs but he wasn't stopping, he ran into Death Room and immediately started yelling

"Shinigami-sama! Shinigami-sama!"

Grim Reaper turned to Rin, clearly confused. When he saw wounds, he flinched.

"What-?"

"Monsters! Vengeful Spirits!.. People who kidnapped Tachiko-san.. They are making an army of them! W-we have to do something..!"

Rin was trying to catch his breath, the fact that his heart was beating fast only made bleeding worse.

"… Spirit, take him to infirmary, quick!" Lord Death ordered to red haired Deathscythe by him, who wasn't any less confused or startled than the Grim Reaper. He though, followed the order and helped Rin who only held for few minutes before passing out.

* * *

**A/N: That's it for today, I'll do my best to keep up the work coming, biggest breaks between chapter posting could go from a week to even a month. Anyways, that's it for now. Peace out!**


	13. Magic Mirror

**A/N: Hello everyone! Sorry if this chapter is poorly written. I had the idea but it was difficult to put into words…**

**Let's see where we left of last time; **_**Rin met man from his childhood that was supposedly the one that attacked Kidd and ordered Giriko to kidnap Tachiko by the orders of "Them" he speaks about. He ordered the vengeful spirits to attack Rin. The shard Rin found protected him long enough to get to DWMA. Though injured severely, he warned Lord Death about them. Now Let's see what happens…**_

_**Chapter 13**_

_**Magical Mirror**_

* * *

**Wednesday, November 19th, 09:28 a.m. - DWMA**

Tachiko was running trough school halls, just minutes earlier she heard that Rin was attacked. After less than a few minutes she was back at infirmary, from which she was dismissed a few hours ago. Though when she darted in she only saw Stein.

"Wh-where's Rin!?" She asked, trying to catch breath, though when she saw cold face expression of adult meister, she got even more worried and straightened up "H-he isn't, he can't be-"

"He was transferred to hospital due to seriousness of wounds…" Professor cut her off, fixing glasses

Tachiko stared up to him, clearly not even slightly calmed down.

At that moment doors opened and Yoshiki entered, his broken leg was slowing him down.

"I told you to wait!" he wheezed while trying to walk into the room, "I'm still not used to these crutches!" he stopped when he saw that his meister was rather upset.

"H-hey, look, Rin's a tough guy, he'll recover.." he then looked up to Stein, "Professor, do you know in which hospital is he in?"

"Safe Soul's Hospital, at Skull Avenue." He replied

"Thank you." Yoshiki said then turned to Tachiko "We have one more period then we'll visit him, now calm down, we should go back to classroom, the next class is about to start."

Tachiko hesitated for a bit but agreed. She thanked the professor and went back to class with Yoshiki.

* * *

**09:44 a.m. - Saint Soul's Hospital**

Rin was lightly sleeping in his bed. He had an oxygen mask on face, blood transfusion and bandages all over his body, partly covered by a nightshirt and pajama bottom. His usual clothes were on table near the bed, along with his glove and headband. Ever since they brought him to hospital they had been treating is wounds. Most of them needed stitching, the worst were bitemarks and claw wounds, and on top of that, he got a mild brain concussion from being constantly thrown around last night. They ended just a few hours before.

His eyes slowly opened, the first thing his look reached was white ceiling of room. After a few times trying he sat himself up. He looked around the room; It was a small, clean room with dark blue linoleum floor and light blue walls. In it was a nightstand, a table and two chairs mentioned before and a big window with curtains currently pulled over it, despite them, he could clearly see that outside is a sunny day.

He let out a sigh, what happened yesterday was still a mere blur to him. He then took off the oxygen mask and unstrapped the blood transfusion device from his arm, what was it now when tank is empty?

Barely a second after that there was knock at doors.

"Come in.." His look slowly went to doors as he spoke. A nurse opened doors, by her side were Kidd, Tachiko and Yoshiki.

"Young mister Yakari, you have visitors." the nurse spoke, "Doctor said-"

"Let them in" Rin cut her off calmly.

After a few seconds of silence she nodded and continued her walk down the hallway.

He slightly smiled as they walked in. Yoshiki sat on one of chairs by the table while Tachiko put a small bag with a cartoony octopus wearing a headband and chopsticks drawn on it on the nightstand.

"We brought you some Takoyaki on our way here" she smiled, clearly relived that he's alright.

"Thanks. I really wasn't expecting that someone would visit me right away.." Rin said, smiling back

"So, how're ya feeling?" Yoshiki asked, looking at him

"Not too shabby actually." Rin replied in a rather casual tone.

"You sound like you don't remember what happened last night at all" Kidd said in a serious tone, moving the curtains to side and letting the sunshine inside.

"To be frank, it's still in blurs." Rin replied leaning back to bed, "Only thing I know is that whoever or whatever got me, got me bad.."

After a few moments of silence, Kidd spoke again, avoiding everyone else's eye contact "Father said you darted into Death room screaming something about Vengeful Spirits and Monsters.. Needless to say, it was uncertain how were you still running counting the shape you were in…"

That's when all started coming back to Rin, the monsters that attacked, the man that made all that happen, the mirror shard, _the mirror shard…_

His eyes widened as he almost literally jumped to feet, ignoring the confused expressions of others present in the room he ran over to table with his clothes and started digging around his shirt's pockets. He felt relief and more adrenalin coming when he felt his fingers touch a glasslike, smooth surface. He pulled the shard out and looked at it, he only saw his own eye this time. That droopy, dead grey eye was staring back at him.

"Uh… What's with that piece of glass?" Yoshiki asked after a shorter pause.

"That's the thing that both saved me and almost got me killed last night..." Rin said, still staring at the mirror shard.

Seeing the confused faces of the three he told them everything that happened last night.

"You're saying that same person that gave you a part of his soul also planned attack on Kidd and kidnap of Tachiko?" Yoshiki asked

"Precisely" Rin replied, look glued to the mirror shard, like he's still expecting to see something in it but only his grey eye kept staring back at him.

"Look, I still think you made all that up. You could've got a concussion, by the sound of how hard you hit the floor when you fell off chair" Yoshiki said, looking at Rin

"Made that up?" Rin looked up to Yoshiki with nose of anger in voice "Oh sure, I made all that up, I made up being beaten to death, I made up this whole situation!" he then ripped a bandage under elbow and shown a deep bite mark that doctors couldn't stitch up "I made this up! Wake up and face the facts, those things are coming for everyone else!"

"No, I meant-" Yoshiki tried to continue but Tachiko gave him "Shut it" look

Rin exhaled, calming down "Though, if I could figure out how to hack into that security system, to get access to rest of shards, to the one through they had been watching whole building, this would all be done soon.." Rin said quietly, looking back at shard

Seeing he's alright, and that he clearly needed to think some things through, they left. Rin didn't even seem to notice.

_"But wait a minute…"_ A thought suddenly popped up in his head, _"He knew I had the shard, he practically called me there, and definitely was aware that those monsters fear it. Heck, he's definitely one who trained them to fear those… Then what was the point of ambush if he knew monsters wouldn't kill me after ordered so? Did he only want to intimidate me? No, then he would only scare me… Maybe I was the courier that was supposed to last only to warn others? No, that doesn't fit either.."_ he looked up, _"What kind of game are you playing, Koroshi?" _((Rin's nickname for the antagonist, it comes from Japanese word "killer" or "murder", written in kanji as: "殺し"))

* * *

Meantime, in forest, the same person Rin was thinking about was playing around with a mirror in a locket.

He was tall, he had slightly tan skin, dark, dark brown hair that was a little longer than shoulder length and the famous, bluish purple eyes. He was wearing grey cloth covering nose below as usual, black long coat, and black pants, shirt and shoes.

"Should I pay our poor Rin a little visit?" he spoke to himself, though as if he's expecting a response from someone else.

"We got ourselves exposed more than expected, Master" he continued after short pause "we better proceed with caution.. The Shinigami now won't let anyone get close to the girl, especially not the younger one."

After a longer pause he continued "Understood, Master.. We'll get your long deserved body back.." he said slowly closing the locket and putting it back into pocket.

* * *

**A/N: Hey everybody! Sorry for short update that took long, I'm again running out of ideas. Well, despite this one being short and crappy, I hope you enjoyed. In the next one: **_**Students are starting to get attacked, do we finally get to find out Tachiko and Rin's past relation and with that, their true life paths?**_** That's it for now, peace out!**


	14. Troubled Souls

**A/N: Hello guys! Yeah, yeah, I know you're all mad and all, I was delaying writing and thinking about progress of story, and about all me being too formal when it came to talking with you and EXTREMELY poorly written story so far, grammar mistakes and all. I promise I'll fix that later on (I won't rewrite the chapters, I'm seriously too lazy for that… ****ごめんなさい…****)**

**By the way, I was imagining Those monsters the unknown man in black created from vengeful spirits of victims that died in experiment of isolation in which Tachiko was trapped in, like Shadow Beasts from Twilight Princess, but with more red markings on the mask. Ya know, for you to imagine the bloodthirsty bastards easier. Now, where were we?**

**Ah yes, last time**** we left off Rin getting attacked after finding a mirror that led him to monsters and helped him get rid of them before they could tear him to miserable shreds… Yeah, poor guy, he's still mad at me for doing that… No matter how calm and harmless he may look, he's TERRIFYING when mad! Now then, enough chit-chat, let's move on with the story.**

* * *

_**Chapter 14:**_

_**A Troubled **_

_**Soul**_

**Monday, November 24th - 10:50 AM - DWMA**

It was a cold morning in Death City. The streets were empty and silent, the snow that fell now froze like everything else that could be too; puddles, wet wires, windows, almost everything.

But, opposing to that cold emptiness, in the Death Weapon Meister Academy was rather warm and crowded as always, but more noisy than ever before, much to a certain weapon's dismay.

For Rin, it was a hard and annoying morning. He was just let out of hospital, but warned not to push himself and to try to get angry or upset much, which wasn't an easy task.

His identity, secrets, everything he was trying to hide, was exposed. Every step was followed by whispering of people near him, every blink was carefully examined with threatening looks of his colleagues. Two things that he couldn't stand, Noise and attention, were the only two things he was getting. He tried his best to ignore it, along with piercing pain he pretended not to feel after they took him off painkillers so that he could finally move from that damned hospital back to his room and continue working on the case, and continue examining the mirror shard. Of course, he had to go to school too. His parents simply ordered that, without even blinking an eye at the fact that their son was nearly killed.

All that hit him after he slumped onto his seat in the most distant corner of the Crescent Moon Classroom.

"Geez…" he sighed silently, "I shouldn't be thinking only about myself… Others had it hard lately too…" he continued mumbling to himself and glanced down at the front rows, at Tachiko and her weapon. His eyes narrowed more, leaving them as mere thin slit, drastically different from his usual droopy eyed, careless look.

_"Tch… There's something off… No, there was something off ever since they rescued her… It's almost like m-"_

His thoughts were cut off by sharp pain in chest. He groped his shirt and bent over slightly in a quick movement.

_"Damn it… What is it now..? I don't remember those things attacking me there…" _

"Are you alright?"

Cold voice of young Shinigami standing behind him brought him back to reality.

"I'm alright…" the black haired weapon replied, returning the glare of golden eyes.

"I was not meaning your physical self, nor your mental state." the boy replied slowly, "You noticed it too, didn't you? Your soul response is different than before the attack, I can sense the other… 'Foreign'… Part of your soul reacting.."

"Yeah.. It's like it's fighting my original soul… Like some kind of a virus.. I can do nothing about it, unfortunately."

"I see.. Chest pains should be more than expected then. Cases like this are unusual but it should pass shortly."

"I sure hope so. I can't stand another thing budging me at my current state."

The Shinigami nodded in agreement just before the bell rang, marking the start of their next period. Kidd went back to his place in front rows, between the Thompson sisters. Rin just leaned on the desk with elbow, resting his head in his right hand as he dully stared at the Teacher's desk and board in the front of the classroom as professor Sidney entered and started the class with announcement about upcoming holiday, counting they had less than a month until winter holidays. Rin didn't listen at all, but was stuck inside the walls of his own mind, thinking about the current events, and got really frustrated after not being able to make any clear view of goal of the enemy after good 10 minutes.

The chest pains stopped as quickly as they came, as Rin tried not to think about them. He knew that if the "transplanted" piece of foreign soul got stronger, could either take over his current soul, making him a marionette, or simply eat it away completely, leaving his body as an empty, tormented shell. Either way, he'd die after a short time, or a long time, filled with suffering.

The more he thought about it, the clearer it was to him that it's inevitable, at least one of those two, because he already knew that the foreign shred of soul stitched into his own is from the enemy, that has enough ambition and power to make it happen.

When he realized that his thoughts slid to that he gritted his teeth and bowed his head a bit. He wasn't going to think about it, or he'd get paranoid. No way. No way in hell he's going to let that happen too soon.

* * *

**04:20 PM - DWMA Halls**

"Rin's been acting awfully strange lately.. What's up with him?"

"Beats me" Soul replied in his usual sedate voice. "Guy did get beat up just a few days ago, so it shouldn't be weird.."

"I guess you're right.." Tachiko replied, looking down a bit

"Not just his behavior, his soul response too." Maka added on, "I can't define it, but it's something like a battle between Ying and Yang…"

"Whatever it is, I don't like it." Yoshiki joined the conversation, "I've got a bad feeling about him and all this what's been happening recently."

The four were making their way down the now empty main hall, talking about the recent events.

"But hey, one of the brighter news is, thanks to a Kishin we beat on our last mission, Yoshiki gained a new transformation!" Tachiko smiled cheerfully, trying to lighten up the mood.

"Really? Tsubaki did that once too, when she battled her brother…" Maka replied

"Well, the guy was some far relative of mine that went berserk…" Yoshiki nervously said, rubbing back of his head, "I guess only weapons with relations to opponents that are family members that also have weapon abilities can adapt the weapon abilities after devouring their soul…"

"Look who listened to Professor Nygus' lectures." Tachiko added playfully. "Anyways, his new form is a two bladed Scythe! Should we show them, Yoshiki?"

"Sure." he slightly smirked and transformed and took on a form of a double bladed, two meters long scythe, with each blade being one meter long and classically slightly bent. The blades were both silver and with different patterns engraved in them, one had curly black intervened lines, and other was ribbed by diagonal, black, straight lines. One blade was pointed right, other left, each other at the opposite end of the dark blue metal stick (that had black a few centimeters wide black area in the middle, and silver on its ends) they were on.

"It nice offense and defense, if I spin it, it can be both at the same time." Tachiko said as she held her weapon partner.

"Wow…" Maka glared with interest before Yoshiki transformed back

"It may not be the most practical weapon ever, but it can be a nice change from fighting with only a Katana. And, we can do a different form of Soul Resonance too." brown haired weapon said calmly, with a smile on his face.

"It's still a pretty cool transformation." Soul grinned and fisted with Yoshiki _((in this case, "fisting" should be something like a brofist, I dunno))_

"Indeed it is"

"E-eh?" Tachiko turned to see Kidd, leaned to a wall on the corner, "Geez, bro.. Don't sneak around like that…"

"I apologize." he said with his typical cold face expression, "I just came to tell you that you should leave academy building soon, Father ordered that students go home early due to an important staff meeting." With that said, he looked at Tachiko dead in the eyes and continued, "I still have some business to do at the library and a talk with Father that can't wait, so I'll be coming home later."

The young Shinigami turned and walked away.

The four watched him leave, everyone thinking what the hell was that all about. After a few seconds though, Yoshiki excused himself and said he'd better go to his dorm, so they said their goodbyes as Yoshiki headed to the dorms and the trio headed out to streets.

"Kidd's been acting really distant lately… Is everything alright with him?" Maka suddenly asked, turning to Tachiko.

"Don't ask me, he's been giving me the cold shoulder for a while now." Tachiko replied and sighed, then continued rather casually "It's like we're two strangers living in the same home. I have no clue why, though."

"That's strange for the mister perfect Shinigami." Soul said nonchalantly

"I told you not to call him that." Tachiko replied in an annoyed tone, "But I have to agree, he acts awfully weird. He pays slightly less attention to symmetry than usual, and says barely a few words every day."

"He isn't very talkative usually anyways."

"He was too silent. Even for his standards. And he seems kinda… Melancholic." Tachiko commented.

"Well, maybe he just needs something to cheer him up." Maka suggested

"I guess you're right. I'll do a few things, I've got plenty of time before he comes home." Tachiko waved, then ran off. "See you two tomorrow!"

"Oi, Oi, watch your step, it's slippery!" Soul said loudly to her, but they shortly after lost sight of her. "Geez, she's always running somewhere.. It's annoying.."

"Leave her alone, you have other worries. It's your turn to cook dinner."

"No way, I'm tired.."

* * *

**09:12 PM Gallows Mansion**

Kidd entered the warm mansion with only a deep, tired sigh.

_"That took longer than I expected.. Liz, Patty and Tachiko are probably already asleep"_

He took off his shoes at the doorstep and switched into slippers, then took off his usual coat and headed to the bathroom. On his way to there, he stopped by the living room; Nobody.

"Yes, they're definitely asleep.." he mumbled to himself when he finally noticed something.

Not one thing in mansion so far seemed to be even a millimeter off, and the whole building was cleaned. He was caught in quite a surprise, knowing that he didn't do a thorough inspection in the Morning and that nobody leaned around the house for a whole week. He ignored it and proceeded to the first floor bathroom, washed his face and hands, and just when he was about to go to his room, he smelled something and stopped.

Roasted meat.

Was he just so tired he was imagining one of his favorite foods' smell when almost all but one of the mansion's residents were sound asleep?

He walked downstairs and peeked into kitchen, only to see Tachiko, cooking.

"Tachiko?" he asked, clearly surprised, only to get a slight startled jump from her side.

"A-ah, you're finally home!" She smiled, turning around to look at her brother, "I was guessing, since you looked kinda down lately, I could clean up the mansion a bit, cook your favorite dinner, and set things symmetrical how you like them, so you could go to sleep early. You sure look tired, so I'm glad I did."

She then put a smaller bowl of Consome soup on the table, the main dish of mildly spicy chicken teriyaki with sesame and rice on side and instead of regular bread, Nikuman _((Nikuman is meat in bread cooked on steam, shaped like dumplings))_

She sat on the other side of table with a plate of a few Nikuman buns.

Kidd was still a bit surprised, but smiled.

"Thank you, sister." He thanked and sat down.

"Bon appétit!" She grinned cheerfully and started to eat.

Kidd wasn't expecting this, but was glad nevertheless. Only when he smelled the teriyaki he felt how hungry he actually was.

"Aren't you going to eat some teriyaki too?" Kidd asked just when Tachiko was about to bite into one of her Nikuman buns.

"No, no, I'm not that hungry. I ate after I cleaned up a few hours ago, so I'm not very hungry." she said and took a bite of Nikuman.

They ate and talked, but for real this time.

* * *

**11:02 PM **

"Let me help you clean up.." Kidd suggested after they both finished their meals.

"Nope." Tachiko denied, "You need to get some sleep, I'll clean it up."

"Hey, you've put a lot of effort into cleaning the house and fixing the asymmetry I left last morning, and after all that cooked. You must be tired. I've got to repay you."

"It was nothing." she said picking up the dishes and carrying them to kitchen, "I insist you go take a long shower. I've worked for a few hours, I can work for a few more minutes."

Kidd wanted to put another argument, but he was too tired to argue, and Tachiko was a real hard head when it came to talking. When she decides something, there's almost no point in trying to talk her out of it.

"Very well… But please don't stay up for long."

"Don't worry, I won't." she smiled, washing their plates.

Upon hearing that, Kidd climbed up to first floor bathroom and showered, changed into his black pajamas, then went into his room, that was also cleaned up.

He laid down in his bed that also had fresh covers. It was enough a few seconds for him to fall asleep.

Around midnight, Tachiko too ended all of her chores, showered and headed to her bedroom. She changed into her loose light blue pajamas, slumped onto bed and without pulling blanket over herself fell into land of dreams, or better said nightmares.

* * *

**Tuesday, November 25th, 11:40 AM - DWMA**

"What? Impossible!"

"Another one?"

"I sure hope I'm not the next…"

"When they did to him, I saw it, that's horrible!"

"Rumors say same happened to the Yakari guy…"

"They say those are monsters trained by some traitor…"

"Monsters? Don't be silly."

"Uwaah, I'm afraid!"

"Maybe that traitor is the same guy that's been kidnapping the people a month ago."

"Or women."

"Or neither."

Endless chatter filled the halls and classrooms of the Academy, making it hell for Rin once again.

"Hey, at least they dropped the talk about you." Tachiko tried to cheer him up.

"Yeah, but for what cost, another student got beat up nearly to death by mysterious creatures." Yoshiki added, leaning to seat by Rin's.

"You're not helping at all." Tachiko looked at him slightly annoyed.

"He's right.. It's the fourth one since you got attacked." Kidd spoke to the silent black haired boy, "Looks like the ambush at forest was their final test before the massive attack.."

"They're taking down the strongest Meisters and weapons, one by one."

"Then it's just a matter of time before they attack me!" Black*Star suddenly spoke from the entrance of classroom.

"Have you been eavesdropping on us?" Yoshiki asked the blue haired assassin.

"So what if I was?"

"I'm sorry…" Tsubaki said quietly from her place behind her meister, "He's been like this ever since Rin got attacked…"

"I'm all fired up and ready to fight that guy!"

"Tone down a bit Black*Star, this is no reason to be happy…" Maka scolded the male meister, "Someone could get killed pretty soon…"

"Did you give the mirror shard and rest of the known information to Shinigami-sama?" Kidd asked ever so silent Rin, who nodded in response.

Th bell rang and they all headed to their seats, as Professor Sidney walked in and started talking on his way to the front of the classroom.

"Alright class, before we start the period, Shinigami-sama has an important announcement." He started as he uncovered a big mirror by the board. In a few seconds, Lord Death appeared in the mirror.

"Hello Students!" he greeted them, and after he got a polite response from students continued, "As you all know, recently there were many attacks on students, that started a week ago, on November 18th. To avoid any more students getting injured, it'd be the best if students wouldn't go out without a pair, weapon meister pairs are the most recommended. The more there are, the harder it is for them to attack. It would also be for the best to avoid the forest, especially at night. That's all, take care!" Lord Death finished and the mirror went back to normal.

"That was broadcasted across every mirror in the academy, so you don't have to worry about other classes. Now, to resume where we left off yesterday.."

* * *

"Well, that was more bad news for me." Rin stated when they left the classroom, "My home is a mansion in forest, and counting I can't seem to find a meister I don't have any company." _((I know, I know, forest is pretty far away from the city, nothing grows in a few kilometer radius around the city, but in this Fanfiction, the forest got really close to the city as it grew, so the city's now almost surrounded with the forest and going to the furthest lines of Lord Death's soul.))_

"I know it's hard for you to match wavelengths with a person because you practically now, more than ever radiate two different ones, but you didn't seem like you were trying at all." Yoshiki replied.

"I got tons of mail in my locker ever since I got attacked, mostly letters from girls that already have a partner… I can't believe how shallow that is, liking someone you don't even know for their family fame or personal fame…"

"I'm sure you'll find someone soon, the school's big and there are new people joining almost every day.." Tsubaki said.

"I hope so…" Rin said, then waved and walked off, but when he got lost in the crowd he saw a couple of girls coming towards him, asking the same things.

"Why didn't you answer the letter?"

"Are you hurting? Is everything okay?"

"My family's pretty rich, I think we'll might get married someday."

"I'd be a great meister, I'm sure we'd be even better partners!"

After only a few moments he lost it, pushed a few of them in front of him aside and ran as fast as his legs could carry him. He ran and ran, until he got to the third floor's east hall, the first completely empty one he could find. He stopped, leaned against the nearest wall and tried to catch his breath. Shortly after he stopped he felt the same sharp pain in his chest. He again groped the shirt at his chest and slid to floor, still breathing hard.

"This is bad…" he pushed through teeth, "He's going for the long, torture filled death… I should've expected that from that sadistic bastard…"

"Now now, that isn't the way to talk to now your essential part of lifeforce.. After all, I'm the one that gave you real life.." A sly voice from the hall spoke.

There he was. The tall man with purple bluish eyes and tan skin, completely dressed in black, with a cunning and devious smirk on his young looking face..

"How did you get here…!?" Rin asked, pain in his chest was getting worse by the moments passing, but yet he succeeded to push himself back to feet.

"I have some unfinished business here.. With you and your friends. I think you know well what business Master and I've got here, and I'm going to finish it soon" his mouth bent into a cunning grin, revealing unusually big canines, like ones of a vampire.

"Like hell you will, you damn brat!" Rin yelled as he swung his fist at the tall figure, but soon hit the floor.

_"What the..?"_

He turned his head to see the man, still standing, but flickering a bit like a hologram.

"A thought projection..?" he asked, and got a mocking laugh that makes blood run cold in response

"Did you really think I'd really come here myself to taunt you?" The man said, looking at him with a smirk that soon turned into a cold look of hate and disgust. "Enjoy your last months, brat." he said before disappearing.

"Wait, you shady bastard! I'm not done with you!" Rin yelled before his chest started hurting even more, pain spreading through more near parts of his body, making him cringe and convulse.

"Gh… For once… I'd like there were some people around…" he silently groaned through

After about ten minutes, just when he was about to give in and pass out, the pain started to go away and he could get up again.

He hurried as much as he could with his tormented body.

_"As much as I hate to do it, I'll have to stop by the infirmary… And report this growing mess to the principal.."_

* * *

**06:20 PM - Forest**

"Thank you for coming with me.." Rin quietly said in his usual, slightly coarse voice.

"It's no problem. After all, if you get attacked again, it could be critical.." Tachiko replied kindly but causally.

"Then what about you? I don't think the monsters would come after me again after tasting my blood. It's probably bitter like the things I like to eat."

"Don't worry, I've been taking martial arts since I was really little. Even if it came to getting attacked I probably wouldn't get hurt much before succeeding to escape. Of course, unfortunately, there's always a chance that we'll get attacked like this."

"Well, if it comes to that, you're free to stay in my house. Those things are awfully aggressive and fast for beings alike zombies."

"Say… About.. _'Those Things_'… What are they like..?"

"Let's see… They move on all four, have thin but strong limbs, horrifyingly sharp claws, and their skin gray, like stone wrapped in smooth leather, with black markings looking like both bent and straight lines making weird shapes.. They have black strands going from their head that appear to look like hair, and their face is covered by a stone mask- No, their whole head is like a big stone mask, with red markings in weird shapes, which some parts of their body too have.. The places where those markings and how many of them they have are probably only thing that differs them, or else they'd all be identical.. They're fast, strong, aggressive, and can let out a bloodcurdling screech that leaves ringing in one's ears…"

"That sounds horrifying…" Tachiko replied in awe, counting that Rin survived attack of one of those awful creatures

They were almost in front of the white marble mansion.

"I lost my head when I first saw them and tried to run away, but turning my back on them and running head on was a huge mistake.. So be careful, okay?"

"Right… Thank you for the info.. I'll see you tomorrow." She smiled again

"Yeah… See ya tomorrow…"

Tachiko turned around and walked off back into forest, heading back to streets then home.

"Geez.. It's already getting dark.. What a pain.." she sighed after a while, and raised look to the dark azure sky, then continued thinking out loud "What am I even doing..? I continuously try to lighten up everyone's mood even though I hide my grim one behind a fake smile…" she continued in a tired voice then glued her look back to ground. "Well, my options are limited as it is, this is practically the only thing I can do for now.. And 'that'… Isn't doing any good eith-"

Her thoughts were stopped by crunching of branches and sniffing sound, like one of an animal. She stopped, thinking it's maybe a wolf, but the truth was much, much worse.

What she saw wasn't a wolf, but one of the black beasts that felt her soul nearby. Her heart skipped a beat and she let out a frightened gasp.

_"Run!" _ was her first thought, but then she remembered what Rin told her. Reacting tensely or turning your back on them is equal to death. Then what was she supposed to do? Running was out of question by then, her legs felt like they were made out of hard, solid steel, and wouldn't move.

So that's what silent utter panic felt like.

Not a very pleasant feeling.

"I….I'm screwed…" she pushed through.

Right then the creature ran at her, almost too fast for her to dodge. She threw herself to her side onto ground with the creature nearly tackling her, it ran into the tree that was behind her, its claws flew missing the target and getting stuck in the wood.

Her mind was completely empty, panic blocked all the thoughts except a few commands.

_"Get up!"_

_"Now's my chance!"_

_"GET THE HELL OUT OF THERE!"_

She stumbled clumsily back onto her feet and ran as fast as she could.

The beast let out a sound similar to parrot's screech while it was trying to free its hand. After it ripped it out of the tree, it let out the same sound, more aggressive sounding this time, and ran at Tachiko once again.

She thought about dodging again, but instead she jumped and spinkicked the creature right in its head, slamming it into a nearby tree. The creature remained still with a crack on his forehead, it let out a shrill cry.

"No damned creature… Is drinking my blood tonight…" she panted, narrowing her eyes as she continued to run.

She ran and ran, feeling sharp pain in her right forearm and left lower leg, but was still too scared to check what's wrong with them. She barely noticed anyways. Even when she reached the streets she continued to run, she slipped on four frozen puddles, almost fell on the first three and finally hit the ground flat after slipping on the fourth.

"Damn it… My nose.." She said getting up, panting, with her nose starting to bleed from the impact it hit the ground with. "At last… I lost it… And I'm near home.." she raised look to see Gallows Mansion's eerie black silhouette in distance, at the west side of city, where the sky is still the brightest, despite the Sun is down. She took her handkerchief out of pocket and put it under her nose, tightening its bridge with two fingers to stop the nosebleed.

* * *

"I'm home.." she said upon entering the mansion and leaving the shoes by the entrance. She walked through the main hall into the living room.

"Liz, could you please cook the dinner tonight? I'm not feeling too well.."

"Oh? Uh, sure." Liz said looking up from magazine she was reading

"Thank you.." Tachiko smiled slightly, pretending to wipe her nose to hide the traces of dried up blood under it. "By the way, where's Kidd?"

"He's reading in the Dining Room."

"Eheheh, he never uses the study! Kidd's so silly!" Patty joined in happily

"Thanks again, see ya." Tachiko said as she left the living room and headed to the dining room just a bit further in the main hall.

"Bro?" she said as she peeked into the dining room. Kidd was sitting on the end of the table that's near the entrance.

"Hm? Oh, welcome home, sister." he said, raising look from his book, "You sure took your time."

"Sorry I'm late, Rin was still in a pretty bad shape so I escorted him home."

"Very well then." he said rather calmly but then his look lowered to her arm, his face got more serious and took on a bit worried expression, "What's up with your forearm? Are you wounded?"

"Huh?" she lowered look to her forearm to see that the sleeve there is stained with blood. _"So that's what that stinging pain was…"_

"Ah, that's nothing, I fell and probably scratched myself somewhere.. Don't worry about it, I'll patch it up myself."

"That looks like too much blood for a mere scratch.." He got up "Let me take a look.."

"I said there was no need to… The extra blood must've came from my nose."

Kidd looked at her suspiciously, but upon seeing the marks of dried blood under her nose, he let her go.

Tachiko hurried upstairs. He didn't want to lie to her brother, she just didn't want him to be worried. After all, she's alive and almost completely well. She took a long shower, patched up the scratches (thankfully they weren't deep enough to need stitching), then changed into her home clothes.

_"That damned thing must've scratched me when I dodged and when I counterattacked… Shit, it hurts…"_

Upon disinfecting and bandaging them up she looked at bloodstained sleeve of shirt, darkened sleeve of trousers and now completely red, originally white, sock, of her uniform.

"Well, this isn't going out in the dry cleaning…" she sighed and carried them to the bathroom, then spent hour and a half trying to wash it off, then she switched to tricks of removing blood she's heard in school, and after two hours in total succeeded to wash off the blood.

"Finally…" she put it away to dry, then got up "If I'll have to do this every damn week I'd go crazy… Well, time for dinner then homework."

She said, getting up and going downstairs. Little did she know, that a tall figure, dressed in black was standing on the edge of forest, looking at the Gallows Mansion,

"Even though it's not noticeable to her friends, she knows something's changing… Our plan is successfully unfolding, Master… ….. …. … .. Oh, no, no, Master, we can't hurry it or else it severely damage our plan, and we got so far.. ….. …. … .. I thought you wanted her back, your precious emerald.. ….. …. … .." After another longer silence, his face expression darkened and shifted into one of sadistic pleasure, his eyes narrowing and mouth bending into a cruel smirk.

"Yes, Master, Understood."

* * *

The tall man waited, and waited, watched the lights in the mansion slowly turn off, one by one, until the mansion was completely dark. He then got up, walked towards the building and in a swift movement jumped, grabbing hold of the balcony of Tachiko's room. He pulled himself up quickly, then pulled out a key from pocket of his angle length black trench coat, put it into the balcony keyhole, turned it and opened the doors without making a sound. He sneaked over to her bed and looked at her sleeping.

"Oh, how fun it would be to torture you… But Master has plans, Master needs you alive.." he voiced quietly then put his hand above her head, palm down, "And, unfortunately for you, Master is in hurry.." tips of his fingers flickered into weak emerald green light, his amused face expression changed into a scary, dark one, "So, I'll have to speed things up.."

The green light entered her head through every hole it could go through. When a certain amount entered, Tachiko gritted her teeth and shut her eyes even tighter, gripping the sheets with her hands.

The man watched this from the balcony.

"Enjoy your last months,"

He jumped off the building,

"Mistress.."

* * *

**A/N: Here! A longer one, descriptive, with proper grammar that you could actually understand for once as an apology for such a long wait and past crappy written chapters! Next up, again, is a timeskip of a few months. I'm soon going to my summer break by the coast, so sorry if this story suffers a bigger delay again! Like I said in the in the description of the chapter, ****ごめんね****,** **ごめんね****,** **ごめんね****a thousand times!**

**As always, I reveal nothing before the timeskip, and yes, again, ****ごめんね****for pissing you off with another freaking cliff-hanger with that shady bastard… … I should really stop apologizing, eh?**

**Anyways, that's all from me for now. See ya all in the next chapter!**

**~ Helena Nights**


	15. A Doll's Dream Pt 1

**A/N: Hello! Another update! I was bored and I didn't feel like drawing, and as you probably don't know, for some reason, no matter how tired I am, I can't fall asleep during the day, except when I'm extremely sick (which is also a rare thing to see), which would be a good way to pass the time, but, unfortunately for me and fortunately for you, I can't do it.**

***sighs* My, my, look at me, I'm babbling about trivial stuff again... I already wasted much of your precious time, so I wouldn't be surprised if you skipped all this. But first, before you skip the rest, I want to say three things:**

**1st: Just for the record, I love reviews! It's kinda empty in the review section, so I'd like if you shared your thoughts on the story with me. No matter if they're mean, suggestion (how to improve my writing, possible pairing between OCs and / or Official characters…?~) or praise, I'd appreciate them!**

**2nd: From this Friday to the 23rd of August, all of my stories will be put on hiatus, due to me going to my family's summer house. Even so, I might be able to write stories on my dad's laptop (he lets us bring it with us) and post stories during the "Happy Hour", when our limit for internet doesn't count and we can be on as much as we want for those four hours (watch videos, play online games, post pictures, have video chats, and of course, update Fanfictions!)**

**3rd: Even though this will mostly be a filler to lighten up the mood, I hope you enjoy it. And also, I will include clothes description for the OCs, you already know what other characters would dress like. Oh, and also I decided the tall man's name, that's now Seiyu**

**So, now that's cleared up, and for those that didn't skip this yet, a short review of the last chapter wouldn't hurt, no?**

_**As more students are falling victims to the undead monstrosities hunting for souls in forest, with Tachiko almost getting hurt too, the atmosphere in DWMA grows more and more unsettling and loud much to Rin's dismay. He's been having weird chest pains ever since the attack due to the ' transplanted' part of his soul raging more than usual. The tall man in black shows himself to the two friends, leaving them with almost same lines, then disappearing. For several months, it's all been fine, but what'll happen now?**_

**Of course, I won't bother to try to calculate the right day counting that this is past the new year theme and whatnot, it'd be just too much work, and I doubt any of you care the accuracy of the date, am I right?**

* * *

_**Chapter 15:**_

_**A Doll's Dream**_

_**Pt. 1**_

**Saturday, June 1st - 10:45 AM (noon) - Skull Avenue**

"Geez…" Tachiko leaned to back of her seat, "It's really been far too hot lately.. I know summer is nearing but seriously…" (she's wearing light blue sleeveless shirt with black kanji on it and white short pants covering only her thighs, her hair tied into a low ponytail)

"When it's heat, it's about mentality…" Kidd said calmly

"Yeah, says a guy that wears clothes made of at least some Shinigami Skin fabric that keeps him at perfect temperature all the time.." Tachiko groaned.

It was a hot day at Death City, cats were sunbathing, people were shopping for the upcoming summer season, and the ten friends were sitting outside of a coffee shop, eating ice cream.

"What about you, Rin? Isn't it a bit too warm for long sleeves?"

"It's like Kidd said," The black haired boy said, "It's all about the mentality." (he's wearing thin, plain, gray elbow length sleeved shirt, thin loose black vest (like Kidd's but even looser) and black shorts to knees)

"Liar," Black*Star muttered in his usual cocky tone, "It's because you're so cold all the time. I maybe can't sense wavelengths like Maka or the OCD kid over there can, but I have common instincts, ya know? And mine says it has something to do with your soul!"

"You're right, but it's its nature, and can't be helped." Rin shrugged it off with his weary smile

"Whatever, I think you should Lighten up a bit, it's not cool to always keep acting cold.." Soul said leaning back to his chair

"Look who's talking" Maka said and raised look from her book to Soul

"Hey, I have an idea! Let's go play basketball!" Black*Star suggested in his loud and cheerful tone.

"We'd get a heatstroke if we play at this weather… It's over 30 degrees Celsius out here…" Liz said, cooling herself off with a pamphlet she found.

"Just once I agree with her, we'd all die if we tried to do some asphalt sports…" Yoshiki muttered, slumped over his chair like a cloth, (he's wearing red loose sleeveless shirt with black outlines, black shorts and has his hair tied up into a small, low, spiky ponytail)

Tachiko was silent for a few seconds, then she saw what Liz was holding and took it from her hands

"Hey, what the-!? That's mine!" Liz said, confused.

"This is a pamphlet for the newly opened pools in the south of the city!" Tachiko said opening it, "Maybe we can cool off there!"

"Alright!" Black*Star said happily in sync with Patty and continued on English: _"Let's go to pubic pools!"_

There was a short silence before everyone else started laughing

"You two… It's not 'pubic', but Public… Public pools.." Maka and Tachiko laughed

After a while they all calmed down, and said they'd meet at the pools at noon and 30 minutes that day.

* * *

**12:30 - Deep Springs Public Pool**

"Yahoo!" Black*Star yelled as he jumped into the pool, followed by Patty that was already red in face. When they fell in they both splashed Kidd, much to his dismay

"I can't believe they actually put sand here…" Maka smiled as she kneeled over the small area by the pool, grabbing a handful of sand

"It's all around the city, so it probably wasn't a problem for them to get some." Yoshiki said as he stopped by her. (Yoshiki is wearing black and Red swimming boxers, still with his hair tied in the ponytail and bangs held behind his ears (they're usually covering his right eye))

Maka blushed slightly when she saw him; he always wore loose clothes and hid his rather nice built form. Soul saw that and slightly frowned. He didn't know why, but he just didn't like that look. (and in the background Patty and Black*Star just splashed Kidd again then pulled him into the water)

Tachiko was observing all that, then grinned. (Tachiko has her hair down, and is wearing emerald green swimwear with black skull sign on her right breast)

She sneaked up on Soul and pushed him at Yoshiki, who fell and pushed Maka and all three of them ended up in the pool.

Tachiko laughed "You guys looked like you needed to cool off."

All three had straight faces to nose in water, they exchanged looks and grinned

"Heh.. Heheh… WAUGH!"

All three pulled her into the water

Meanwhile, Liz was napping on one of the wooden deck chairs, Tsubaki was drying off and talking to Rin under shade of the same parasol. (Rin wearing black and white knee-length swimming boxers and that same loose black vest, still unbuttoned, but without a shirt underneath, and his hair was limply hanging down as usual, but this time with no headband to hold any of it at least slightly up)

"You aren't going to take a bath too? The water's really nice."

"No, thank you.." Rin replied, "It seems like it's a bit too wild kind of fun for me."

"Very well.." Tsubaki smiled, getting up, "But you should really try the waterslide, it's really good." she finished and walked away with a towel

"Phew, you guys sure are persistent…" Tachiko sighed with a smile as she moved her wet bangs off forehead, "Hey, Black*Star was just here, where did he go?"

"No idea." Maka shrugged

Just then Black*Star dived out from behind of them and grabbed the back of their swimming bras, clicking off the holders that kept two ends together, making them fall

"You flat chests don't need that!" Black*Star laughed.

They kicked him in a synced motion all the way across pools, holding their swimsuits up, with Yoshiki and Soul just standing a few meters away with a confused and flustered face expressions.

"Th-they aren't so flat-chested after all…"

For that response, Soul got a Maka-Chop, and Yoshiki got his head sank into the water by an annoyed Tachiko, brushing her foot on his head like she's extinguishing a cigarette, bubbles of air floating to surface, and both girls holding their tops up.

Rin watched from under the parasol with a smile.

_"Who cares if I don't have a meister? These guys are the best companions I could wish for… No, how do they call them… Friends?"_ he thought as he took a sip of soda from a can

"Oi, Rin!" Tachiko walked up to him with a towel on her shoulders, "Aren't you going to take a dip too? It's a bit hot for you to be just sitting around, you're going to have a heatstroke.."

"Don't worry, I'm fine." Rin replied

Right at that moment, Black*Star and Patty sneaked to them, picked up deck chair with Liz on it and carefully carried it to pool, slid her onto a blow-in bed in the pool, snickered and let her flow

"Seriously, it's not fine to go to pools and not even try the water. You could at least take a walk around."

"To be frank, I'm feeling kinda tired lately…" the black haired boy said as he set down the can of soda

"So you too, eh?" Tachiko said as she leaned onto her Deck Chair, "… Did the chest pains return…?"

Rin just nodded in response, looking down, with Tachiko's glare fixed to him. They just sat in silence for a while.

"Did you go see Professor Stein?" Tachiko finally asked again.

"You know yourself, DWMA is a mess.. 94 dead students and around 300 attacked isn't a small number.. And to think it all started at the same time when the chest pains originally started.. Professor Stein couldn't give me any better diagnosis than just saying that my Soul Response has changed like last winter.. He says that I should avoid upsetting situations, because they seem to power the 'foreign' part of my soul." Rin looked her dead in the eye and continued "There's no way of treating it, it just has to calm down again.."

"Is there really no way of treating it?"

Rin just shook head in response, and the following was a long silence.

"Geez, don't get all pessimistic on such a nice day.." Tachiko said in a lazy tone as she got up, "If your chest isn't hurting now, then you can at least have little fun, besides-"

A muffled yell and a loud splash interrupted her. She smiled

".. Liz's up.."

Rin silently chuckled, "Well, I guess I can give it a try…"

"Great!" she grinned and jumped into the pool, then started swimming

"Wait for me!" Rin said as he took off the vest and threw it onto his deck chair, and jumped in after her.

Soon, Kim, Jackie, Harvar, Ox, Killik, POT and POF came, soon followed by professor Nygus, Stein and Spirit;

They all took a day off to enjoy the weather.

* * *

**02:50 PM**

After a while, everyone was resting and eating lunches they brought.

"It sure was fun, eh?" Yoshiki said as he took a bite of his sandwich.

"Yep." Tachiko replied, smiling widely.

They all talked while eating, cheerfully ignoring all their doubts and problems. There wasn't a lot of them to start with anyways.

After the lunch, they all rested and finally the fun continued, even more wildly than before.

"They're just like little kids.." Stein said, looking at them from the deck chair on the side of the pool, smoking a cigarette,

"They have to enjoy it while it lasts, no?" Mira Nygus spoke up from seat by him

"And I see someone enjoying other type of fun…" Stein said nonchalantly as he looked over to Spirit, who was flirting with a Lifeguard

It appears Maka was looking in the same direction and got annoyed by the sight, which Yoshiki used as a chance to throw himself on her, submerging her,

"Gotcha! … Eh? WAUGH!"

Maka quickly switched their positions

"Nope, I gotcha.."

"What the- HEY!" Soul yelled at Black*Star who was waving his underwear,

"Not so tough now, are ya Soul?" Black*Star mocked with a grin on his face

In a blink Tachiko submerged him,

"What's up with you and swimwear today?" she spoke in a slightly annoyed tone, with an embarrassed and flustered look on face as she tugged Soul's boxers out of Black*Star's hands and threw them back to their owner with Patty behind her, laughing as usual.

"Thanks…" Soul said, sinking a bit deeper into water and getting them back on.

"No problem," Tachiko replied as she let Black*Star dive out.

Meanwhile, Rin challenged Kidd into a swimming contest, and they were currently at the longer, recreational pool.

"You're a surprisingly good swimmer…" Kidd said after they were done, sitting at the edge of the pool,

"You weren't bad yourself" Rin replied smiling, still in pool, holding for the edge and trying to catch breath, "You almost won, I'm not used to move around much except when I go to missions.."

"You decided to go without a meister?"

"Decided and succeeded. I've collected eleven souls.."

"Not bad. The youngest graduate, Demon Guillotine Justin Law, also graduated without a meister."

"Yeah, I heard for him.."

Kidd got up to get towels

Rin watched him leave and sighed,

"Man, this is kinda exhausting… I'm really not in the best condition lately…" he muttered and sunk to nose into the water, then looked around the pools. Nothing in particular caught his eye until he say a figure of a tall man with tan skin and very dark brown hair in the main pool, he strangely reminded Rin of Yoshiki.

Rin kept looking at the strangely familiar man, until he turned almost like he felt his glare and then Rin saw it;

Narrowed, bluish purple eyes that seemed to slightly sparkle for a second.

Rin felt his chest starting to hurt, like it was impaled. He winced and doubled up slightly, hugging his torso with his free arm and gripping the edge of the pool with the other one harder, trying to pull himself out. Suddenly, his arms went numb and slid from the edge as he sank into the deep, recreational pool,

_"What the hell..?"_ he thought as he tried to kick his way back up to surface, but to no avail. He couldn't feel his arms, and soon started running dangerously low on oxygen.

His vision blurred and he could only make out bubbles of air floating from his mouth and a shadow from above the surface, reaching down to him.

* * *

"Rin..."

"RIN!"

Rin's eyes opened as the distant voices became clear. As soon as his eyes focused he saw the blur were his friends and professor Stein.

".. H-huh?" He said as he sat up, grabbing his head

"Are you okay?" Tachiko closed in on him with a worried look

"I... Uh, I think so... What happened?" Rin stuttered over his words before opening eyes "I felt chest pain.. My arms went numb and I Fell into water.."

"It appears you tried to get out of the pool, your hand slipped and you hit your head... You fell back into the pool."

"Luckily, my cousin came to the rescue." Yoshiki said, looking up to the tall man with tan skin.

"Allow me to introduce myself..." The man said in the familiar voice, kneeling by Rin and ignoring his startled expression, "My name's Seiyu Reisen. It's nice to meet you..."

Rin was silent for what seemed like years to him. The man that gave him chest pains, the man that put him and many other students in hospital and into graves, the very same man that cursed him when he was a child in order to manipulate him, just saved him? He must be going insane...

"What's up with that look?" Seiyu smiled kindly "You look as if you just saw a ghost."

"N-nothing... Thank you.." Rin almost automatically replied, shaking off his thoughts for a moment.

The tall man got up "Well, I'd better get going.. See you all later"

"... S-say, Yoshiki, your cousin doesn't look half bad..." Liz said, looking at him as he walked away

"Don't even think about it..." he looked up to her rather carelessly "He's 24, that means a good 7 years older than you.."

Liz growled at the boy's attitude silently. "What do you care?"

"He's my cousin if you forgot already, blondie."

Liz tried to grab him but he stepped out of the way and she ended up head-first in the recreational pool

Rin was silent the whole time, as well as Kidd who was suspiciously looking down at the young weapon.

After a while they all cleared up, most of them went back to pool after they were assured that Rin was fine. Though, Tachiko didn't seem like she'll just let go of what just happened.

"Hey, Rin?" she said, walking up to him once again

"Oh, hey Tachi.. You aren't going back to the pool?" Rin said, again at his place under the parasol

"Nah, I'm kinda tired." she said sitting down by him

"I see..." he said, leaning back

"... You seem like something's bothering you.."

"It's nothing.." he said and caught a glimpse of Tachiko's glare that made him realize that that kind of response isn't going to work with her, "I just.. Thought I saw something else... Like I was slowly drowning with chest pains.."

"That was probably a hallucination because of lack of oxygen, you already know that.."

"Yes, but not only that... Th- Eh... Seiyu looked... Familiar to me. But you'd call me mad if I told you how, it all seems kinda sketchy to me too..."

"Well, I'll not call you mad, but if you don't wanna tell, then it's fine." she said, looking at the Rin who wasn't returning the glare, "... Listen, maybe you just need some rest to think it all over, I would've too be shocked if I nearly drowned."

"I guess you're right.. I'll take a nap." Rin said, lowering the deck chair so that he was laying down.

Tachiko stayed at his side until she was sure he's sound asleep. Who would've expected something like that would happen? Well, accidents happen every day, that's what a normal person would think, so did Tachiko.

Though her sixth sense was raging at this last event. There was something fishy going on.. and she was going to get to the bottom of it.

But, like I already said, fate chooses its favorites. And it was playful while handling this group of friends. Though, the ending of this story depends on its good will. WIll the outcome of this little game be happy, or tragic? We can only hope..

* * *

**A/N: Yes, I FINALLY updated. Took me a while, I know. I was busy with drawing projects for this fanfiction. If you wanna see them, go look up my profile on Google+, Helena Mizaki (I have a really cute Sasha Braus profile photo so I'm kinda hard to avoid. I'm also currently only one with that URL on the website)**

**And yeah, I'm updating all fanfictions slowly, so be patient, I'm going to beach every day and don't get to much time online at this heat.. So be patient, mkay?**

**Honestly, I'm doing final edits on this at 1 AM so I can't think of a good preview... I guess you'll just have to wait or, let your imagination flow**


	16. A Doll's Dream pt2

_**Chapter 16:**_

_**A Doll's Dream**_

_**pt. 2**_

* * *

**AND THE JACKASS RISES FROM THE DEAD**

**A/N: Hello everyone, did you miss me? Not important now, is it, eh? I've kept you waiting forever with this update, and again, I'm so freaking sorry (Can't use vague language here it seems), but! It has been one year anniversary of this fanfic on November 23rd, I'm late as hell (ha ha, I lied), but I just wanna take this opportunity to thank all of you who have been following this fanfiction ever since its crappy start to right now. Not much has changed, has it?**

**EXCEPT of course the fact that I updated the first 4 chapters and fixed them up a bit, I recommend you reread them before progressing onto this one. Or don't. It's fine either way :p**

**I just want to warn you, this fanfic is nearing its end and I'm still drabbling over what'll be the outcome. I treat my characters horribly, I'm not gonna lie, but I hate killing them (permanently at least). So we'll see what comes out of that.**

**So, anyways, I'm gonna update my other two fanfics in the next few weeks hopefully, I'm in 7th grade and it's not very easy with the two new subjects I recently got. But let's leave all that BS behind for now and get to the review of the previous chapter!**

_**After months of uneasiness and attacks on young meisters and weapons the weak peace breaks yet again and the long covered scheme starts unravel. What lies will be discovered once this truce that lasted over a decade finally breaks?**_

**Oh yeah, also major warning for possible Creepypasta clichés for those of imagination vivid enough to imagine the things I wrote down.**

* * *

**Thursday, October 1st, 10:12 AM - Class Crescent Moon, Shibusen**

It was a chilly morning in the Death City. The Sun was almost completely covered by thick clouds, hiding its mocking grin. Cold wind blew the fog from the last night away and continued roaming the empty streets of the silent city.

The Crescent Moon classroom was rather silent for a recess, the usual lively chatter nowhere to be found. Many students weren't there, and every now and then their colleagues would find a flower on others' desks and give it a sad look; tears were nothing short of usual when that happened.

They all knew, those with a white flower on their desks have left to never return.

"Tachiko, what's up with you lately?" Yoshiki asked his meister "You look like you haven't had any sleep in weeks…"

"That's because I haven't…" She replied, practically lying on her desk. She lifted her head up a bit, revealing tired, Emerald green eyes "All this going on… People dying, fighting, and those weird dreams…"

Yoshiki sighed at the last part. Tachiko hasn't been getting any sleep because of strange nightmares. Already reflexively, he looked over to Rin, who was staring at the blackboard with a dull look.

He hasn't gotten any sleep altogether it seems.

"I thought we could at least have a peaceful celebration of our first year here… But those darn things keep popping up everywhere, we've been delaying it for a month now.." She continuing, joining Rin and giving the blackboard a dull look as well

"Hey, I know things look bleak, but we'll get through this. What do you say about going to the bookstore or grabbing something to eat after school today… No, even better, let me make something!" Yoshiki smiled "There's no doubt you'll get a good night's sleep after that."

Tachiko returned a small smile

"It would be nice… Though, you remember what happened the last time you tried to make dinner for us?"

"Alright alright, I admit, I'm not a Master Chef or anything, but I'm decent." Brunette weapon replied goofily, already knowing her response

"How about I make us something, eh?"

"If ya insist…" Yoshiki replied

"Great!" Tachiko said, already in a better mood, "You can bring your brother along too, he's free from work tonight, no?"

"Yep. We could invite Rin too, he has been distancing himself ever since the school year started, it wouldn't hurt him to get a bit positive."

"I guess you're right…" Tachiko said and looked over to Rin, who was now face in his book "… He's out cold.."

"Well then, we'll just have to ask him later" Yoshiki shrugged as the bell rang

* * *

**06:35 PM - Gallows Mansion**

"Thank you for inviting me over, you guys.." Rin spoke

"Aaaanything for a friend!" Tachiko said with a wide smile, looking into the Living room briefly before going back into Kitchen

"Man, cooking really cheers her up…" Rin said more silently

"You have no idea.." Kidd said from the armchair, lips bent into a small smile

"Though, truth be told, if Liz wasn't in there too she'd probably set something on fire already…" Yoshiki added on

"Oh, is something wrong?" Seiyu spoke from the hallway, walking in and watching he doesn't hit his head on the door's frame. Rin's expression changed only slightly at the sight of him

"She hasn't getting much sleep lately." Yoshiki sighed "She keeps saying something about repetitive bad dreams."

"I see…"

Only a second after there was a sound of metal clanging from the kitchen, followed by Tachiko's tired voice

"Come on, Liz, fifth time today…"

"I-it keeps slipping out of my hands!"

"Aw geez… Luckily that was just water… Dinner's ready!"

All got up and walked into the Dining room.

* * *

**11:02 PM - Yakari Mansion**

The residents of the Mansion were almost all sound asleep, but one room remained with its light on.

Rin was at his room at the window, petting a cat.

"You're a stray, aren't you?" he whispered to it in a tired tone, gently scratching it behind its ear as it purred in response

"I'll take that as a yes.." he smiled and continued playing with the cat until a knock at the doors interrupted them.

"Young Master?"

The cat jumped off the window frame and ran off. Rin sighed

"Yes?"

"Your parents are concerned. They told me to tell you to get some sleep if you don't fall asleep by now, it's worrying."

"I'll try. Thank you."

Rin waited until the housemaid's footsteps went quiet. He fell onto the bed backwards, letting out another sigh. Sleeping wasn't even the last thing on his mind. He gave up trying to get a shuteye weeks ago.

His chest pains were only getting worse, his mind was trying to wrap itself around so many things, he kept feeling as if he was close to discovering something but his brain was too tired to progress, but mind too loud to let him sleep. The frustration was almost unbearable. Even if he got a few minutes of peace to drift off he was awoken by nightmares. He knew that if this keeps up he'll either experience an accident or get really sick.

While he was busy staring at the ceiling the cat from before jumped into his room, by him onto his bed and laid down.

"Get comfortable if you like, I won't be sleeping anytime soon."

* * *

Meanwhile, at the Gallows Mansion Tachiko was turning in her bed.

_She was in_ _Death City. The sky was cloudless, but still grey, with no sign of Sun or Moon. The streets were empty, colored in a strangely unsettling beige-white color, but full of mirrors; She knew this image far too well._

_She decided to just stand there, thinking that nothing will happen if she just stays there, but it wasn't long before she started feeling uneasy, followed and found herself glancing over to a mirror. The reflection was awful; it was her with black eye sockets, the dust was replaced with bodies, some people she recognized from her class that got killed. She stood there in silence until she saw a shadow move behind her in the mirror and felt a cold shiver go down her back. She ran as the dust on the ground got thicker with each passed street. She felt as if she was being chased but avoided looking at the mirrors, even though they could shed a light on whatever was chasing her. She ran and ran, every few steps her body got a bit heavier. Eventually, she fell, dust getting into her eyes. She sat up and rubbed it out of her eyes, only to meet her own gaze in the mirror. The black eye sockets seemed to be dripping with ink. She stared, terrified. _

_Suddenly, wind rose, raising the dust up for a while. When it finally calmed down the mirror showed her- no, that wasn't her. It was a lookalike of her, with black eye sockets, dripping with black liquid and with two red dots inside. A cackle was heard from the reflection as its shadow formed a tall man._

_The silhouette behind her drew a quick, glowing green line in air, severing the reflection's head from its body. The last thing she saw was the green glow growing stronger and finding herself unable to breathe. The growing gravity struck her down yet again._

Tachiko gagged and shot awake, breathing heavily, bathed in cold sweat.

Her hand flew up to her neck, checking if it was still in one piece. She let out a sigh of relief

She couldn't understand, she's been through the same thing night after night, how come it upsets her even though she knows what's going to happen?

She laid back down, wondering if she should try to go back to sleep, but the flickering numbers at her digital clock made her realize it's basically pointless, 5 AM.

She got up and started her day, though earlier than usual still pretty much like any other.

At the same time Rin was examining the mirror shard from a few months ago for the thousandth time. It has been like a piece of a normal mirror ever since.

"Ugh.." Was all he succeeded to push through before rolling to his stomach as he usually did when he was frustrated.

"Why?" he continued, unaware he was rolling himself for 180 degrees with every new sentence

"Why is this god forsaken mirror not doing anything?"

"Come on, give me anything"

Naturally, no response

"… Stupid th-"

He hit the carpet with a quiet thud. After a long silence only a sigh could be heard as he pulled himself up onto the bed the onto feet

"That's it, I can't take any more of this." he said, taking his pajamas, or better said house wear off, revealing his slim form; he was even paler and skinnier than usual, he's been losing appetite for a while now. Not even his favorite, fatty tuna, interested him that much anymore.

"I'm not going to just wait here like his pawn, waiting to die…" He kept mumbling to himself, "If he really takes me for that much of a fool, he's dead wrong.."

He quickly changed into black trousers, his favorite shirt and dark brown boots. He wrote down a quick note, saying he's not feeling well and that he's going to try and get some sleep, asking the maids not to disturb him. He then put it halfway under doors to the hallway, took a black, fur lined jacket, dragging something else out of the closet too.

It was a long rope-like craft, seeming made of old sheets he used to sneak out often in the past and hid it from his parents and nannies as well as he could. He went to the balcony, tied his old handiwork on the fence and lowered himself. He'd stuffed what he thought were the necessities into his pockets, such as the mirror shard and a pocket knife along with a bunch of small cloth bags and started walking through the snowed forest.

"Now, where was it?" he kept mumbling to himself often, stopping every time to look around more carefully.

The cold wind was blowing through the trees' crowns, causing them to rustle softly.

_"Why are there no more of his followers around?" _Rin pondered, walking through the puffy whiteness covering the ground.

Suddenly his steps came to a halt.

"Finally…" He whispered, his look rising up and revealing his now more than ever tired eyes, making his empty glare that was filling with over exaggerated happiness almost like that of a lunatic, and the fact that he was seemingly talking to thin air making it even more so like it "Thought you'd hide from me?"

After getting to response, he shrugged

"Heh… Oh well, the hunt's over"

He took the glove off his right hand and put it up

"This may be the most outrageous and stupid thing I've done since I joined this school, but who gives a damn anymore. Am I right, Seiyu?" Electrical sparkles appeared between his hand and the invisible wall; It was like a hole tore in the image of the forest before him, revealing strange trees with weird wispy leaves and withered, crooked trunks. Right in the front a familiar stone step pyramid appeared, But even before he walked through the portal that was getting bigger and bigger by the seconds passing, he noticed that something was off

"You old bastard…" he said, kicking a pebble and looking up to the ruins of what used to be a well hidden dungeon, Rin's eyes now flared up with suppressed rage

"One step ahead of me, eh? I don't think so. I've got a whole eternity to find and bust your sorry ass." he continued mumbling as he neared the enormous pile of debris and started digging around, frequently finding pieces of walls stained in red, parts of decapitated bodies, as well as a scratched orb that radiated something weird.

Something _dangerous._

He recoiled from the strange object like he's been burnt. He could feel his flesh crawling from just looking at the little thing, the glimmering orb was left alone for not even a few seconds before getting penetrated with pocketknife's blade.

Rin raised the glasslike ball up to get a better look

"So this was that awful madness source.. I haven't seen one of these in a while…"

After a longer pause he said to himself once again, "Oh well, safer in shards than whole"

He threw it to the stone ground as hard as he could. It shattered into bits and pieces just like any cheap crystal ball fortune seers use.

He looked down to it in disgust and finished "It's still evidence either way."

He took out a bag and put any pieces big enough inside, then put it back into his pocket and resumed digging.

He found no interest in the already previously documented bodies and chilling messages on the broken pieces of walls, but rather in every mirror shard or a more suspicious object, paper or message he found.

After a few hours he headed back to his house, exhausted, carrying a bunch of seemingly unimportant and needless junk in his pockets. He walked through the thick fog back to his mansion and climbed back up to his room - thankfully, the cloth rope was still there, untouched, waiting for him. After he climbed back up, arms barely supporting his weight, he untied the knot and hid it again, then closed the balcony doors and pulled the curtains over, even though the fog and clouds weren't allowing a single glimmer of light to get through the thick, grey wall.

He shook everything that he'd found out of the little cloth bags and pockets onto his desk; a few damaged old papers and notebooks, weird old jewelry, stone pieces with weird symbols on them and of course, the shattered glass ball that's still glimmering in soothing white light along with many, many mirror shards. Somebody uninformed could even say he was a crazy boy that robbed someone.

After inspecting everything he took out a little box, put the objects into their cloth bags then into the box, locking it shut and putting the key onto his keychain, then into his pocket, zipping it close right after and lying onto the bed. He took off his boots and jacket, placing them both near the bed. He locked that box for a good reason, not only because of fear that somebody might try to get in, but that what's _in_ there might try to get _out_

He looked wearily at the clock, clearly without any focus in his eyes. Still, blurry neon green lights flickered before his eyes:

**11:12 AM**

He groaned silently and slipped into the unconscious, meeting another nightmare.

_It was Death City- no, better said, somewhat what it'd look like in a thousand years; ruins of his hometown. The structures were almost like they were made from black marble, almost a contrast to Tachiko's beige white vision of it._

_"Oh great." Rin sighed, like he was bored, digging his hand into his pockets "Come on, I know the line between your low budget horror story you embedded in my mind and the reality you sick freak. Now let's get this over with."_

_Getting no response but a sudden rise of the wind he looked around and started walking. The ground was covered in black dust, almost alike volcanic ash. He could feel the wind almost wrapping itself around him, the dust getting into his eyes and the coldness growing from his chest, inside out._

_After a while he could no longer see a thing, but kept feeling an overwhelming desire to sleep. To just lie down, to succumb to the growing cold in his chest. He felt his legs getting heavier until he finally collapsed._

_A poisonous green light had rose from the black ash and started enveloping him. He felt… Warm. Pleasant. Did it come to save him? Did it come to offer comfort? Did it come to show him the way out of this grim sandstorm?_

_And it was so warm…_

_So inviting.._

_So warm…_

_Suddenly, the tiny voice in the back of his head had become loud and clear, causing him to jolt up, throwing off the ash-like substance that was piling itself up on him and burying him._

He jolted up in his bed and looked around frantically.

After a long pause a nervous chuckle escaped his lips. He ran fingers through his hair, lips bending into an unsettling smile that was everything but happy. He kept mumbling something to himself slipping every now and then something in Latin, like curse words.

"Of course… No way to scare someone who knows they're going to die, who has no real bound to the people around him… Except… Except… You really are a being sick to the core, are you..?"

More shaky words escaped his lips. He had turned into a nervous wreck when he figured his own biggest weakness. His first line of defense, his biggest fallback, was his biggest flaw, and was going to ultimately become his downfall. That thought scared him out of his mind.

His unconscious craving for affection.

* * *

**A/N: Oh man, I'm finishing this so late.**

**I'm too tired to wrote a preview the next one, I'll might do it tomorrow or on Wednesday when my holidays start. Bye now!**


	17. United Families Of Humanity's Traitors

**A/N: Alright, the last chapter has probably left you with some questions.. Oh well, I hope I'll be able to stuff the answers in this one somehow.**

**Yeah, the story's getting grim, and I hope you like sad stuff because these last few chapters will have a lot of such, and the feels train ain't stopping for no one.**

**Brief review of the last chapter:**

_**The attacks of the shadowed beasts continue, counting in more and more fatalities each week, and along with it Rin and Tachiko are being victims of severe insomnia and frequent, repetitive nightmares. Bothered by the fact that he has no clues to move forward Rin sets off to find the old dungeon separated from this time and space again, and doesn't lose hope even upon learning it's been destroyed. After finding any remotely helpful or familiar thing he returns home and gives in to his weariness, waking up after another weird dream to discover the contents of it have changed and having a nervous breakdown after realizing his mortal enemy has figured out his weakness.**_

**Alright, onto the new chapter!**

* * *

_**Chapter 17:**_

_**The United Families Of**_

_**Mankind's Traitors**_

**Friday, October 9th, 10:56 PM - DWMA Dormitory**

"Well, it's really getting late, I should head back home." Black haired meister stated, getting up "Thanks for having me, Yoshiki"

"No problem!" her brown haired Weapon replied, smiling kindly "Just get home fast, they said it's going to snow again today"

"My, it's really unusual for it to be this cold this early." The taller sibling of the weapon spoke in his usual, soothing tone.

"I will, take care you guys" Tachiko replied before closing the doors and hurrying out the hallway

"Well, I should probably get going too, it's really getting late." Seiyu spoke, getting up carefully; he could almost brush the dorm's ceiling with his head, "I'll tell the old man how everything's going with you, so just don't mess school up again before they send me again."

"Aw come on, it's just one bad mark. Besides, there's plenty of time before the holidays and you're sticking in this part of the city for a while, no?"

"That's true, but keep in mind, getting bad marks isn't a proper exchange just to get a smart little damsel explain it to you.." he continued in a more mocking tone

"Don't be a jerk, she's just my meister!"

"Sure sure" the tall man chuckled at his remark, "Though, where's that short, black haired friend of yours? I haven't seen him for a while.. Rin, was it?"

"Heh, to you everybody is short.. And now that you mention, it _has _been a while since he last came to school. Though, knowing how little sleep he's getting lately it's not really a huge surprise if he got sick."

"Oh, insomnia?"

"Nightmares." The younger brother sighed and paused for a shorter while, looking to side

"… Now that I think about it… He _has_ been acting a bit weird around you, hasn't he?"

"Has he?" Seiyu said, looking down to his brother in confusion

"Yes, he looks at you like he saw you do something terrible, like he's judging you, or is just plain disgusted… That's really rude, counting you had never done anything bad to him as far as I know, and practically saved his life last summer, though he always changes the subject when we ask him about it…"

Seiyu listened to his brother ramble about his friend's strange behavior, but seemed distracted.

"And I… Hey, what's with the weird expression?"

"Huh?" Seiyu snapped back into consciousness "What face expression?"

"You had a really grim look on your face, is something wrong?"

"Nothing, nothing, I'm fine, I just remembered something I must do and I was already supposed to start." he said, grabbing his black and gray knee-length coat and headed outside, "Take care, little brother." He said with a smile before turning back.

Yoshiki just sat in silence for a second

He could've sworn he saw something weird in Seiyu's eye before he turned away.

A green glimmer.

"… What a weirdo… Well, that's what I'd usually say…" he stood up and took the tray with an old beaten down kettle and tea cups and went to put it away "But now seems something's really off.. … Hm?"

Yoshiki's eyes stopped at a long piece of gray fabric

"Oh, that distracted tallie left his scarf.." He put down the tray and picked up the soft scarf, "Welp, he's not gonna remember to come back for it before it's too late, so I might as well"

He put on his shoes and jacket, closed the door behind him and headed outside. It was long since dark out and snowing and Seiyu was nowhere to be found. Nevertheless, the young weapon kept walking.

It didn't make any sense, he left just a minute ago.

"Seiyu!" he called out after a few seconds

No response

"Hey, you tall doofus, you left your scarf!"

After receiving no response he let out an annoyed grunt and continued walking, following the fresh shoeprint trail in snow.

"Jeez, he really was in a hurry.." Yoshiki mumbled, a cloud of his breath soon after fading and disappearing into the unforgiving cold air.

Though, after a short time, he halted when he saw that the shoeprints trailed off into the forest.

"What is he, nuts?" Yoshiki stood and looked at the dark forest; the trees' branches were still dressed in a thin layer of dry leaves, and some even completely naked, covered in snow. With no lights to guide the dark way ahead the forest looked threatening and scary. Why would his brother go there? Was there some kind of a shortcut there?

"That idiot is going to get himself killed…" Yoshiki said, and after giving it a quick thought he walked forward, following the big shoeprints in the snow.

He walked and walked, the forest was eerie and silent, and only his already concerned voice could be heard breaking it

"Seiyu!"

"Seiyu, you idiot, answer me!"

"This isn't funny at all!"

"SEIYU!"

Shout after shout, getting no response, he leaned against a tree, exhausted. He was by now lost in the woods, the shoeprints faded as the snow fell over them, both his and his brother's.

He was cold and tired, absolutely sick of walking.

"Fantastic…" he sighed, pushing himself back up and continuing to follow the almost nonexistent traces of his brother's shoes shuffling through snow, maybe even hours ago.

After he got far into the forest where the tree branches were so closely grown together that the snow didn't seep through them, but just fell onto them and froze over, making it even darker, and leaving no traces to follow as there was no snow.

Beaten down, Yoshiki slid down under the biggest tree, tired of hours and hours of pointless searching.

"Where the hell did he go..?"

He was cut off by a silent rustle.

Thinking it was some animal he recoiled at first, but after a while followed its source

After passing only a few more trees he could see a dim, green light in the grass. He walked over to it; it was some sort of a green orb, the size of a marble

"The hell?.."

"Brother."

A shiver as cold as the voice he heard went down his spine. It was Seiyu, Yoshiki was so relieved, so angry for a moment, he wanted to turn around to let all that out at the taller sibling but for some reason he was unable to.

Was he scared?

Scared? Scared by his own brother? Nonsense, right? Right?

"S-Seiyu.."

The tall man walked to in front of him

"What is it?" He kneeled in front of his brother, speaking in a soft tone, but his expression was awfully unsettling. His look went down to the scarf in the boy's hands

"Ah, so that's where I left it." He took his favorite piece of clothing and walked back to behind him

Yoshiki had just gathered courage to turn around as he heard growling

"Down you two." Seiyu spoke, putting the scarf around his neck where it belonged

"Seiyu, what…. What is this place?" Yoshiki said in a voice that sounded so weak it made him sick to stomach. His legs were frozen in fear and beads of cold sweat appeared on his forehead

He heard a quiet sigh behind him

"It's by the time you learnt.." Seiyu replied, like he was bored "Let's save all the formalities for mom and dad to resolve and skip right to the point.. Our family has been a part of an union, using things such as dark arts, magic and performing rituals using human souls.."

"H-how.. Why-? What the hell Seiyu!? Telling me that now!?" Yoshiki shouted nervously, "And what's that about mom and dad!? We both know the only thing we have left from them are two gravestones!"

"Pssh, please.. Don't tell me you believed that bunch of poppycock.." the tall man spoke with a small smile on his face, eyes narrowed into slits trailed off to meet his brother's gaze

Yoshiki was standing there, staring at his brother in shock. It felt like years for him.

"Y... You're sick!" Yoshiki shouted out so loudly that his voice seemed to ring through the trees.

The growling behind him got louder

"Now now, you wouldn't want to anger those two.."

Yoshiki finally moved and backed off a few steps. His angry expression faded a bit from his face and just made him look extremely nervous and troubled.

"Th... This isn't funny at all!" The brown haired weapon stuttered, now sounding even more scared; he knew altogether too well what happened to people that got attacked by just one of those things, but two? He was screwed

Two masked beasts closed in on him, but backed off as they heard Seiyu aggressively say some words on, some would even say funny ancient language

"Now, Yoshiki, you have to make a choice. Either join us easily, without fighting, or we'll have to persuade you."

"Rin was right… You _are_ nuts…" He threw the glowing marble at him and ran, but soon found his feet rising more and more…

He was floating in the air, a green light radiating from his chest. He felt his stomach turn as he looked over his shoulder to his brother, who had his hand up in the air, pointed at him, radiating same green light. An eerie chuckle was heard from Seiyu

"I really thought we could do this peacefully."

His chest felt like it suddenly went hollow, like he suddenly lost balance, he fell to ground. No, rather, was slammed into it at full force, then risen back up into the air

"Still not out?" Seiyu's eyes sparkled with dark pleasure and mouth bent into a creepy smile as he proceeded to ram him into the ground and nearby trees

Once Seiyu finally let go of him, Yoshiki fell to his knees then face first onto ground. He could feel his heart beating behind his eyelids. His whole body ached, and he was losing focus. Despite his best efforts to stay awake, he passed out, Seiyu's eyes looking down at him, faintly glowing green being all he could see before everything went black.

* * *

At the same time Rin was locked up in his room, listing one of the notebooks he'd found a few days ago, in the ruins of the pyramid dungeon, a stray cat feeding on his dinner he'd again left almost untouched.

After a while of dully looking at the notebook his look slid to the forest. It was dim but he could see it;

A green light.

He knew it was smart and for now only right to stay away from it. He knew the source and that it had already got the best of him multiple times, and catching the culprit red handed wouldn't help because he'd get discovered. Though, he noticed, this time, it wasn't just glowing, it was flashing violently.

This got him slightly concerned and after only a few seconds his curiosity had got the better of him. He changed clothes and snuck out yet again, quickly heading for the spot where the green light was radiating from. Not even a minute after he arrived, but the light had just went out moments ago. He knew it was too late but still proceeded.

He saw that some trees and spots in grass were slightly done-in. Just what the hell had happened there?

Then, he saw something hanging on a tree branch; Yoshiki's jacket.

"Oh no." he suddenly spat out in a hoarse voice, taking the jacket off "Nononono.. Yoshiki?" he started turning around, trying to shed any light on where they went, but nothing was in sight except grass, naked trees and snow. He did see some shoeprints, but they disappeared completely; not under snow, but as if whoever was making them just disappeared.

"This is bad… This is really bad.." Rin said, digging his bony fingers into the leather jacket, then looked up into the sky; the moon was already low, he's got at least an hour before the sunup; Yoshiki couldn't wait that long.

The boy let out a quiet whimper, pulled his scarf up and ran against the wind; an awful blizzard was just starting

* * *

**Saturday, October 10th, 08:09 AM - DWMA Dormitory**

"Yoshikiiii!" Tachiko voiced as she ran down the corridor towards his room.

"Wake up you doofus! I've got us the _best _mission!" just as she knocked on the doors rather recklessly. Much to her surprise they opened wide with a long creak.

Checking if she had broken them or something she realized the doors just weren't locked.

"Hey, that's not safe y'know, leaving the doors unlocked overni-" she peeked in as she spoke, but stopped as she saw there was no one in there.

"Oh…" she said, walking in and looking around. It was all almost the same as when she left the night before.

"Just where did he go off to?" she said looking around

"…. Well he definitely didn't get up so damn early to miss me. Did he go off somewhere later yesterday?" she thought out loud, silent for a minute before her face lighted up in her previous joy again "… Maybe he went over to his brother's place!"

She locked Yoshiki's room with the key he gave her a while ago and went back outside, pulling her hoodie over her head again.

Just as she walked out of the dorms Rin ran straight into her, knocking them both over

"Ow, Jeez, hey, watch- Rin?" she said, rubbing her head and getting a better look at the short boy "Aren't you at home?"

"Tachi.." he started but trailed off, resuming himself in a more serious tone "Forget it, I'll explain it later, it's a really long story…" he got up, slowly losing focus over his words yet again "… Oh man, you don't look very good.."

"You aren't exactly looking the best yourself.." Tachiko said in a mildly annoyed, but concerned voice "Besides- .. Wait, what's that in your hand?"

"Yoshiki's jacket.." Rin said, looking back up to her and quickly adding on, "Like I said, it's a long story, we've got to hurry!"

"But Rin, the school's closed!"

He ran off in the direction of DWMA like he didn't hear her last words. His feet were unsteady and shaking, he ran and ran until he finally collapsed a few feet further away, falling face first into snow.

Tachiko hurried over to him, giving him nothing more than a panicked look. Though, she couldn't say she wasn't expecting something of this nature to happen. He let out a weak, hoarse cough as she picked him up and hurried in direction of Maka's apartment, which was the closest place they could think of.

He was so light it was upright scary.

She ran against the wind towards the city.

* * *

_Dust rising with the wind,_

_Soft green glow,_

_Shooting u_p awake

Rin looked around himself; the repetitive dream left him disoriented.

"I… Wh…?" he muttered, confused upon seeing he's in a small, familiar apartment.

"Rin?"

Rin's look darted to the doors to the kitchen. A blonde meister was standing there, looking at him rather worriedly.

"M…Maka?"

"Oh good… You're finally awake.." she let out a sigh of relief, sitting on couch beside him and setting down a tray with tea on the coffee table in front of them, "Man, you scared us all good.."

"A..all?" Rin said, still dazed but slowly remembering what happened before he passed out, "W-wait, where's Tachiko..?"

"Whatever you told her got her really worried, so she dropped you off, quickly explained what had happened and ran off to her house." blonde meister replied, pouring him a cup of tea and handing it over

The black haired boy waited for a few moments before sitting up and taking the tea.

"… Where's Soul?"

"He wasn't feeling all that well after yesterday's snowball fight with Black*Star, So he's resting now. It's probably just a cold."

".. I see.." Rin sighed and took a sip of the tea

"Though, Rin, what happened?"

"… Yoshiki vanished last night, and I think I might be onto… how.." His eyes widened as he trailed off, almost dropping the small cup

"What? What's wrong?"

"I… can't remember…"

"… Y-you're just tired, I'm sure it'll come back to you when you get some rest.."

"You don't understand!" Rin said, raising his voice slightly, "I can't! If I do, he'll lure me in! I can't offer to… I won't.. I.. I…"

Rin trailed off again, feeling his heart start to pound in his head and chest. He felt weary again, his chest start to hurt.

The cup fell out of his hands, one hand gripping shirt on his chest, he hunched over and bowed his head.

Maka was confused and afraid; After a few moments like that, Rin just flopped back onto the pillow. She checked his breathing and let out a sigh of relief; as of now, she couldn't do anything other than let him rest- no, there was one thing.

She got up and reached for the phone as she dialed in a few rapid digits. After a short ringing she spoke again

"Hello, professor Stein?

I need your help."

* * *

**A/N: Yeeeee I actually finished this chapter this year. Hurray for me!**

**Anyways, I hope you'll enjoy this. I really think of most of the stuff I write _as_ I write it, so I think the previews are off limits for now chaps.**

**Also, I started another fanfiction, so all of you who like Undertale are free to check it out. If you don't… Welp, just don't!**

**Allllsssooooo if that's the case I'd highly recommend not going to my Google+, Tumblr or DeviantART nor Twitter… Well, I never really do anything on Twitter so I don't really see a reason to go there at all.**

**Nowwww, we got a bit off subject now, but I think you get the point. Until the next time, buddies!**


	18. Origins

**A/N: Wow, been a while since I updated this, so I gotta work quick.**

**The problem being I don't actually know yet what to do in this one XD**

**I usually use the previews as a memo, but back then I didn't write one, soooo….**

**This may be half assed.**

**Welp, anyways, let's get right to it, I feel it coming.**

**Really late EDIT:**

**Man, the title sucks.**

**Welp, so here's the thing. I swear I had an idea when I started writing this, though it fled from me at an amazing rate. So, for a while I've been dawdling on how to write this, and came up with nothing over and over again, so I've just done the basic layout (A/N notes above and the chapter name) and hoped for the best.**

**Then I realized, there were a huge amount of questions I've left out for you guys. Like for example, "Why was Yoshiki's Soul look as if he were dying back in the 10th chapter? How are Rin, Tachiko and Yoshiki involved in all this? And does the name of the last chapter have anything to do with that?" and countless more I can think of. The answers to ones I listed are "Will be explained in this one, again will be explained in this one (partially?) and yes." Ask questions in reviews, I cannot stress enough how much I like reading those.**

**Also, I'm gonna stop with that date thingy, it's kinda tedious to do. I'm just gonna do it sometimes, not necessarily always. Though, time and location will still be at their respective places. As of now, we pick up off the same day the last chapter ended; Saturday, October 10th.**

**I'm probably going to take a while to explain the connection between the three main characters and this cult chapter by chapter, and this one's assigned mostly to Yoshiki. Next up is Rin, and as a Final Tachiko. Things are getting pretty tense, and are as always likely going to leave my characters with PTSD. Welp, then what are we waiting for?**

* * *

_**Chapter 18:**_

_**Origins**_

**? - ?**

"Ugh…" A silent groan escaped Yoshiki's mouth as he woke up to a pulsing headache; he'd wanted to go back to sleep, but the rising pain in his limbs and back had only done the opposite

He opened his eyes; his eyelids felt like they weighed a ton. His vision was a little blurred at first, but it didn't really matter, The sight was the same either way; grey stone ceiling.

"Brother"

"Five more minutes…" The brown haired weapon slurred exhaustedly, closing his eyes and trying to roll to his side; his body felt like it was made entirely out of lead

"Brother we have family business to tend to."

He opened his eyes again, vision still blurry and refusing to focus like in a nearsighted person. Still, he could vaguely make out the image of the man bent over him. Though he could not make out the expression, he recognized him.

"Come on, mom and dad are waiting." Seiyu spoke

"… Is this some kind of a joke, or am I really dead?" Yoshiki replied distractedly

"Neither. Tell me, what do you remember of last night?"

"Not much…" The younger sibling spoke, rubbing his eyes and sitting up with a lot of effort and his brother's help, "But I feel like I'd been hit by a bus.. And what's this mom and dad stuff? We're not supposed to go to the graveyard until… Friday…"

Suddenly his eyes widened

"It's coming back to you, isn't it?"

Suddenly a loud thud echoed throughout the room; Yoshiki had fell off the bed in an attempt to back away.

"Yoshiki-"

"Keep away!" Yoshiki kept backing up with a panicked expression until he hit the stone wall on the other end of the room, soon his vision cleared out completely; He was in a small, clean room with a bed, a window with metal bars, a light bulb hanging off ceiling, a table and heavy wooden doors with weird Rune Writing on them and a bed with a metal frame. Seiyu was still sitting on it, glaring over to him coldly, clearly not surprised even a bit by his brother's reaction, but even a bit displeased by it.

"I want answers!" Yoshiki demanded, fingers on his right hand transforming into full length katana blades, "Where in the world did you bring me!? What's this 'mom and dad are alive' story!? What in the hell did you do and just what the heck were you thinking last night!?"

"I will explain later."

"You will explain NOW!" The young weapon yelled as he raised his right arm at him in offense

Seiyu got up and walked closer; he still had that ominous look in his eyes

"D-don't come any closer!" Yoshiki let out another panicked yell, "I-I'm warning you!"

Seiyu's lips bent into a weird smile as a cold chuckle escaped them

"You're bluffing." He mused, "We both know you can't hurt me."

Yoshiki closed his eyes shut and swung his hand at him, but it came to a stop with a loud _clang_. He opened his eyes.

His brother had pulled a sword seemingly out of nowhere; he held a silver handle with a long black blade made out of iron that radiated strange coldness prolonging from it. His smile had darkened, but his eyes looked mad with dark pleasure, two little green dots of light growing from the pupils.

"You continue to disappoint me brother… I thought you'd know better than to fight again…"

Yoshiki let out a scream of pain out; Seiyu's sword had let out something like static electricity, but at least ten times stronger, Which had forced his fingers to go back to normal. He gripped it with his other hand and shut his eyes.

Not even a second later Yoshiki felt light tugging in his ribcage. He opened one of his eyes a little; he was floating in the air through a hallway behind Seiyu, both his hand and Yoshiki's whole body radiating green glow. Yoshiki recognized it far too well, and started to squirm, but to no avail; Unlike the last time he'd saw that, the tugging sensation in his chest wasn't hurting him.

"Last time you were easier to deal with.." Seiyu spoke calmly

"Where are you taking me?" Yoshiki said with an almost unnoticeable quiver in his voice; he wasn't calm, but at least he wasn't as frantic anymore, "What is this place to begin with…?"

"It's a facility.. You see, last time you were brought to a much smaller, but still similar one."

"A facility…" Yoshiki's look trailed around the hallway. He vaguely recognized them, but the memories were lingering somewhere in the back of his mind, shrouded in fog

"… I don't remember any of this.."

Seiyu let out a small laugh, as if he was humored by how innocent his brother's response was.

"Of course you don't.. I can't say you didn't have any reason to forget it.." he glanced back to his brother with a sneer, "Last time you jumped alongside your friend, during the last year's Soul Festival… While you were there, I thought that maybe we should test your abilities.."

"Abilities?"

"Why, yes." Seiyu replied leisurely, "It's in our blood. Of course, some had always been so-so aware of that, and some needed a _helping hand_.."

His voice had quivered slightly at the last words, even though almost impossible to hear, Yoshiki had heard it. What was this feeling bursting out by fear and anger? Sympathy?

Suddenly it dawned on him; all those trips his father and Seiyu took while he was just a little kid, that troubled look he had every time. Those weird wounds. The sound and sight of his brother waking up after reoccurring nightmares more and more frequently, until, one day…

It all just stopped.

He was more or less back to his old self, but a bit colder. Though he could mask it very well, Yoshiki could see it. At first he was worried, but his brother seemed to grow out of it. He flashed more honest hearty smiles more and more often. Everything had once again been happy.

Yet, yesterday, he could see that look… That same look he had when he got deep in thought out of nowhere. That scary and unsettling expression.

_They broke him._

"Last time, they ran some tests on you…" Seiyu continued after a small pause, catching his sibling's attention again, "And the DNA test turned out positive, which means you have the same abilities. It's going to be easier with you, counting Weapons adapt easier to magic, and you've been showing early stages lately too. Advanced healing, manipulating small things like rolling the dice to some extent- I presume unintentionally."

"You don't mean.. Witchcraft? _THAT'S _what that was!?"

"Well, of course. Do you really think that somebody that's been followed by so much bad luck throughout his life could suddenly get lucky naturally? We're offering you an opportunity to turn your luck for the better, and there's no declining on this one."

Yoshiki stared at his brother's scalp in shock and horror; He could almost feel his sneer. It was too much for him to take in so suddenly.

"Unfortunately, the testing had weakened your Soul greatly… And the pesky Reaper was on our tail, so we had to move out of the facility. You and your charming little friend were left there for the DWMA to find."

"… So let me get this straight;" Yoshiki began, voice raising with anger slowly again, "You've joined a cult, apparently brought mom and dad back from the dead, almost _killed_ my Meister, me and who knows HOW many people…!"

Seiyu's steps came to a halt.

"… Are there any more things you've kept from me that I should know?" He finished, voice filled with hopeless bitterness.

"Well, now that you ask." Seiyu spoke after a few moments, not missing a beat, "Those reoccurring Nightmares your Meister and Rin had, they were also a part of my plan. You see…" He beamed, stopping to catch his breath as a proud grin stretched across his face. For some reason he'd always avoided addressing Tachiko by name, but spoke Rin's with a voice full of sick glee.

"Their families! They all agreed! They are all on the same pathway as us! As you! But you see, dear brother…" he smirked, pointing his index finger up, aiming it lightly at him, "You've been spared of the torture of nightmares, chronic pains, anxiety and panic attacks! Up Until now! Now, now, don't look so grim, I'll explain!"

Yoshiki felt his grip on chest get slightly painful as his brother spoke, enjoying himself in a way that he hadn't felt in years.

"Rin's just a little pest in the way. A moody thorn in my side, whom I've helped long, long ago, and when I needed him, he fully turned his back on his whole family. He was stubborn and used to suffering in silence. Now, he was catching up to our plans, I hate to say, was becoming a real pain. He will suffer. He will either give in to the temptation to rest easy while we use him, or die in awful pain! Knowing that little brat, it will be the second one." He clenched his fist and turned towards his brother again with a triumphant expression, "A sharp thorn, but not sharp enough! Though, your meister on the other hand…. Well…"

He stopped, exhaled and gave a bloodcurdling chuckle, "Well… Mistress will soon join us too, and won't her parents be happy to see her too?"

Yoshiki was caught off guard, the tugging sensation in his ribcage growing more and more painful.

"Of my, how much time I'd lost rambling… I think the Yakari fellows are better suited to deal with you now" he finished, sending him forward into a room, dropping him just by the metal doors and slamming them right after he did so.

Yoshiki didn't have a lot of time to look around, because a woman and a man, crept towards him; They were both dressed in lab coats, wore glasses that seemed to be opaque from his angle, had pale white skin and raven black hair.

"My… What do we have here?"

"Oh, we were hoping you'd be back!"

"Now, we'd better start, we don't want to leave Master waiting!"

* * *

**03:05 PM - Maka's Apartment**

"They aren't picking up." Maka sighed

"Have you tried dialing the house?" Soul asked from the living room

"Of course I had. The maids are saying that his parents are on a vacation and avoid subject of Rin, he isn't picking up his phone, and his parents' are shut off." Maka said, frustration slipping into her voice, "How could've he just ran away? He was out cold one moment, I went to the bathroom and he was gone!"

"By what you've told me he's probably heading for Lord Death's Mansion. Sure, he was upset but you seem more out of it than you should be."

"He could get hurt out there! Tachiko brought him here and said he literally collapsed in middle of the street, same happened a little after he woke up and freaked out!"

"… I guess you're right, but he couldn't just disappear. I mean, you'd hear the doors."

"That's what's worrying me.. Something suspicious is going on.."

Rin was running down the empty streets of Death City, his jacket unzipped and more flailing behind him than being on him; he took quick breaths with almost every step, except he hadn't been heading for the Gallows Mansion, but instead his parents'.

He ran through the double doors and hurried upstairs, taking the locked box with the things he rummaged out of the facility debris a few days prior, and darting straight out the same way; he'd wished the Gallows Mansion was closer, even though it was clear now why his parents' motive to do the exact opposite.

He ran through the streets, slipping and stumbling and here and there, and by the time he'd made it to the black and white building on the West of the city he'd been having serious trouble breathing, his forehead had been littered with sweat and his hands ice cold. Still, his one free shaky hand reached up, curling up into a fist, and slammed itself against the doors three times, just to make sure they'd hear him.

His fist slid from the doors to his knees as he hunched over; His legs were pulsing in protesting pain, arms shaking now more than ever. His breathing was rapid, almost as if he was hyperventilating; The cold air pierced his lungs.

To his relief, the doors soon opened up, revealing a boy with black hair and golden eyes, wearing a white shirt, black pants and a grim expression, like he was stressed out. He looked like was going to yell, but when he recognized the guest his glare softened a bit, but was filling up with confusion and slight worry by moments passing.

"Rin?"

"Wh…. We…." Rin breathed, voice as hoarse as ever, "We… Have…. A… A serious… Problem…"

After a few moments the silence was broken by Tachiko's voice from the living room, nearing at immense speed.

"Brother! What's taking you so long? Come on, this is serious, and the cold is going to-" She stopped when she saw the black haired weapon; Her hair was all down and messy, she was still in the outfit she'd been when she saw him that morning, a short sleeved black turtleneck sweater with a violet shirt underneath and black pants.

"Rin?" She stuttered, obviously upset and confused "How are you..? What are you..? Y-you shouldn't be here, what happened?"

Her look slid over to the small chest under his arm,

"… And.. What's that?"

Rin was struggling to control his own breathing and heartbeat; he was going to pass out again. He could feel his vision blurry and his legs giving away. He felt pathetic. He felt weak. He felt needy. He felt… He felt…

_So tired_

_"Rin!"_ a dim, concerned voice echoed throughout his skull as everything went black.

_Reliving the same old scene, the same old coldness._

_The same old scenario that he'd seen so many times, but each time was like it was the first._

_The same old feeling of body falling heavier and heavier._

_He was running out of time_

_He almost gave in._

He woke up with a start as it's been for at least a few weeks now. His hands fled to his torso, gripping the fabric of his shirt. His heart was pounding like crazy, beating as if it was its last time doing so and causing small pain every few beats. Though, when he felt it, when he felt his dim body head warm his palms up he let out a breath he didn't even know he'd been holding.

_"Good.."_ he thought, _"I've still got time.."_

He looked around the room; he was on the couch in the living room, his chest lying on the coffee table. Footsteps approached form the hallway

"What could've- oh!" Tachiko stopped talking to her brother abruptly and exclaimed when she saw Rin was up and calmer, "Thank god, you're awake…"

She walked over to him, sitting on the other end of the couch. Rin's eyesight was pretty bad, yet he never wore glasses, but he could see clearly that Tachiko was worried and as deprived of sleep as he was.

"What were you thinking? You could've died out there!" she said, returning Rin's still surprised but as always a bit dull look

"I… I.." Rin stuttered; he'd had so much on his mind, trying to make up a way to tell all the information he'd gathered looked pointless as he couldn't even start.

"Tachiko, calm down." The young Reaper said, sitting down onto an armchair opposite of them, "He'd been sleeping pretty deeply, and obviously had a nightmare. I'd be surprised if he was able to think straight."

Rin shook his head, "No, no, I'll.. I'll be fine.. But I didn't run through the city just to say hi, that much I can guarantee.." He finished, reaching for the chest on the coffee table

"What is in that anyways?" Tachiko poked around with questions curiously, "We almost couldn't get it out of your hands when you passed out."

"Remember.. R-remember the time you got kidnapped?" Rin sighed, turning to the black haired girl, and after he got a strained nod he proceeded

"Well, uh… I've been digging around the fact why that happened, and also the subject of my nightmares and chest pains… After a long time I decided I'd go back there, search for some more clues, as dumb as that sounds, it could've worked." he rubbed the back of his head nervously, "But you see, the thing is uh.. Even though I managed to find it again, it was in ruins now even more than before… So I had no other way than to just dig through it for hours to find anything remotely helpful. The thing about that small fraction of universe is that it wouldn't matter if it were hours or days, only like a few minutes would pass.. So I used that to my advantage and found quite a lot of stuff."

He reached into his shirt and pulled out a small key attached to a sting; and even thought he'd rather rip it off (but couldn't, counting his body was practically half drained of life), he took it off over his head and unlocked the chest

It had been a bit rumbled up, but otherwise just as he'd left it; messily scattered so it barely fit. Notebooks, pieces of stone, papers, random weird jewelry, and countless pieces of glass and mirrors.

"Now, I know how you're looking at me," Rin said, not looking up the slightest, "Like I've gone mad. Like this lack of sleep had finally made me crack, but I assure you I'm still not that far off the rails. Each of those things holds some kind of information. By what I caught by now… Well, I can't put it any nicer than bluntly, Yoshiki had been kidnapped about as same as you were."

He flipped through the pages of a torn diary, "Apparently this cult was formed about a decade and a half ago, right about the time that reaper clan disappeared.. And by the time passing it only grew. It appears not only my worst enemy has joined, but my and Yoshiki's parents as well."

"Impossible." Tachiko suddenly spoke up, "Yoshiki's parents passed away when he was still a little kid."

"…. I'm sorry to tell you, but that was probably a lie made up by his brother." He said after a moment of silence, blinking away her objection, "You see, his brother is the furthest in than anyone else- And don't even start," Rin growled as if he knew what she's going to say, like he was getting annoyed, "I maybe don't remember my early childhood life that well, but a kid never forgets a face like that…"

"What do you mean?" The Young Shinigami suddenly joined in again

"I remember him. I was only about 7 at the time, but I remember. My only friend had died in a hit-and-run. I'd been feeling awful for weeks because of that, and one night I ran away from home to pay his grave a visit. Of course, I got lost. I'd sat in the woods, crying for _hours_, until _he_ showed up." his fingernails dug into the notebook, "He sat down by me and we started talking. His voice and expression looked so heartfelt the whole time, like we'd been long time friends. And after I told him what happened, he offered me a solution. A way to rewind the clock, to get revenge at the people who ran over my friend and didn't have enough guts to turn themselves in for killing a freaking kid. A way to prevent from anything like that ever happening again." His lips bent into a bitter smile; it was more as if he has been talking to himself, "But if I knew what chaos my decision would cost me, I'd run away. But no, my younger self became obsessed with the shady teenager's words and greed for power grew in me. When I'd asked him how to achieve it, he just said 'Just sleep tight, I'll take care of that', and touched my forehead. I felt dizzy, sleepy, coldness was growing in my chest. A horrible, yet kind of relaxing feeling. I fell asleep and woke up back in my room."

"Wait a minute…" Kidd said after Rin was done explaining "You'd told me something like this before."

"That's true. But I'd changed the story a little bit;" The black haired weapon returned the Meister's glare, his bitter smile still traced out on his face "I thought it wouldn't get this far, and that I'd be executed instantly. My soul _was_ half corrupted after all. And it's getting worse."

"Worse?" Tachiko asked once again, breaking the tense silence between the two boys.

"They are in a hurry it seems." he continued, "My lack of sleep was firstly just because of nightmares, but now they've shifted. He knows that I grew tired of this. Of this life. Of everything. That I just want some rest. To receive some affection I never got. To get rid of this coldness surrounding me, but is radiating from my soul. And he's trying to use it against me, to gain control. But that last part of my soul, the one that's still somehow in charge is fighting, but barely. If I let myself go easy, if I let it slip for only a moment, it'll all be over. _And he's counting on it_"

There was a longer silence.

"… Wait." Kidd suddenly spoke, "Tachiko, you said something about nightmares, didn't you?"

"Huh? Uh, yeah, I'd been having some nightmares lately, but they aren't really-"

"For how long?" Rin cut her off

"Uh… A month or two now, I guess?"

"What were the nightmares about?"

"Some random scares… Creepy environment, limbs starting to get heavy, my shadow being off and sometimes getting its head severed or just flat out attacking me. … Strange, now that I think about it, that's what I thought would happen when I was little."

"Huh?"

"I'd always think that either my shadow was someone following me, and hid every night when there was no light, waiting to jump out at me. Yet, I was afraid and protected it, because I thought that if something harms my shadow would also harm me.. It's a bit silly now."

"… We might have a problem." Rin said, his face expression sinking into a grim one again, "A huge problem."

* * *

**? -?**

Seiyu stood in the hallway, arms crossed on his chest. He could hear distant screaming of his younger sibling; it'd make him grimace slightly, but not in the way that he was annoyed or disgusted, but… Sympathetic, maybe?

"Hey, Seiyu!" a voice from down the hallway spoke, his trail of thoughts was broken off. He turned his head only to see a lazily postured tall man walking towards him,

"Oh, hello." Seiyu breathed out and fixed his usual small smile on, "It's been a while, hasn't it, Giriko?"

"Yep." the weapon grinned, "What was with that weird face back just a sec ago?"

Just as he was about to reply another scream echoed throughout the empty hallways.

"Man, that brat's noisy." Giriko said in an annoyed tone, even though his eyes glinted with dark pleasure. Seiyu gripped the fabric of his sleeve.

"Wait a minute, could you be feeling sorry for the kid?" Giriko's look loomed over Seiyu's a bit distressed face carefully, but instead of an answer got another question in response

"Don't you have something else to do?"

"Ha ha, so I was right!" Giriko sneered, but seeing the annoyed and angry look on the other's face decided it'd be better if he stopped; He knew well it wasn't wise to throw Seiyu around on the subject of the procedure he'd endured, and his brother was currently going through.

"Uhm, I'm waiting to see the boss too."

"I see."

After a while of waiting in silence, the doors to their right had opened;

They both walked in; The room wasn't much. There was only a body-sized mirror in the center.

"Greetings, Master." Seiyu spoke, bowing a little when the mirror glowed and a silhouette of a man came to life on the other side of the mirror. Giriko never understood why he was sucking up to their boss so much; But he figured, it's better safe than sorry.

There was only silence, but if you listened closely, you could hear it; a distant voice as if someone had been scraping a knife across metal.

"… Yes sir, he's been captured.."

".. He's asking if you'd done your scouting." Seiyu spoke again after a few seconds, turning to Giriko.

"Huh? Uh, right, scouting." Giriko cleared his throat, "It looks to me like That little Yakari kid is onto us, but he's really close to giving in himself."

Just at that moment two people dressed in lab coats walked in; Mr. and Mrs. Yakari. Seiyu squinted his eyes at them slightly in disgust.

"Good day to you, boss." The woman said light heartedly to the figure in the mirror

"We carry good news." The man continued, taking off his rubber gloves.

"Even though the boy's body reacted violently to the magic at first, it's forcing itself to adapt to it. Unfortunately, he is unconscious as we speak." they finished in union

The two aren't really that unusual at the first sight. Mrs. Yakari had long black hair that stuck out at a few places, but was still combed as neatly as possible. She wore rectangular glasses over her dark grey eyes, a light blue turtleneck shirt and a pair of black pants over her buttoned up lab coat. She had pale skin, whereas only a birthmark stood out on her collarbone; The Yakari family sign

The man had black hair combed neatly backwards. He had pale skin and wore a black shirt and pants, with a dark blue tie. As his wife, he wore a lab coat, had pale skin with only the birthmark tainting it, and wore rectangular glasses over his grey eyes. The only difference between the two's was that the woman's eyes were nearly black, while his were stormy grey.

They were almost like two halves of a whole person. They both were, despite their differences, apparently very amused by the whole operation they were running.

"Oh my, is our little boy being troublesome?" The woman spoke

"Not good, not good. We have to tend to his manners as soon as he joins us." The man shook his head.

Their lack of moral response to harming their own child always sent chills down Seiyu's back; Despite the horrible things he'd done, he never wanted to actually harm his brother. He would admit, his destructive behavior sometimes got out of hand, but in spite of that he still had some humanity left in him; Whereas Yakari fellows seemed to lack any of it.

"Though, though!"

"We have some great news!"

"We'd stabilized the Machine to strengthen the vessel once she gets here!"

"And nearly all threats are out of our way!"

"We recommend that we engage in the operation soon!" After speaking in turns, they both finished in union once again.

They all waited, until a voice as cold as ice and as stern as steel spoke from the mirror;

_"There's no need to rush. They'll come marching in here with time. Meanwhile…" _the silhouette turned to the Yakari couple, _"Make sure the boy is ready to fight."_

"But, Master-" Seiyu started in a slightly protesting voice

_**"No buts." **_the voice sounded angry even, _"Yakari Duo, get back to your work. You two get back to your posts."_

After a few seconds in silence, Seiyu clenched his fist and said in a defeated voice;

"Yes, Master."

* * *

**A/N: Welp, big surprise, I'm uploading even though I said I'd be on Hiatus. Luckily, the school hasn't kicked me up yet, so I have some spare time. Whee, my throat's back to normal and I can sing in the choir again.**

**But BOY ain't this a long one?**

**Also, I think I'm gonna start to throw in some random facts about my characters here and there, after every update. Today's fact is:**

_**Even though Rin carves some affection, he's haphephobic (Fear of touch or being touched; in his case, just the fear of being touched by another person). It's not really that strong, but he gets really nervous and uncomfortable when it's anything more than a handshake.**_

**Yep, so that's that.**

**Also, Just to throw this out here, Q&amp;A for the characters are open; For whichever of my fanfiction stories you're following and have a question to ask about, this is your artist: art/Helena-crtez017-Edited-584802915**

**Whoopsie.. Forgot to edit the title… Well, you get the point.**

**And as always, I'm finishing this very late, so I'll fix things up in the morning.**

**And don't forget!**

_**"Reviews = Happy Admin = Quicker Updates!"**_

_**So, Keep 'Em Coming!**_

**See ya folks next time!**


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